Changing Business Attitudes towards Climate Change

I have been studying the changing business attitude towards climate change. Initially there was resistance, then acceptance, cooperation, and now increasing excitement. It is discussed in U.S. Business Strategies and Climate Change paper from Wilson Center. The paper talks about the role of science, concerns about reputation, and the potential of new markets. I would add shareholders have become sensitive of all these as well. In Risking Shareholder Value? ExxonMobil and Climate Change, the shareholders of Exxon accuse the company of risking reputation and missing opportunities. Organizations such as Investor Network on Climate Risk are driving changes at the systemic level.

McKinsey Quarterly report from 2008:

First, there will be efforts to optimize the carbon efficiency of existing
assets and products: infrastructure (buildings, power stations, data centers,
factories), supply chains, and finished goods (automobiles, flat-screen
TVs, PCs). This optimization will involve measures to improve energy effi-
ciency, as well as a shift to less carbon-intensive sources of power, such
as nuclear, wind, solar, and geothermal.
Second, demand is growing for new low-carbon solutions that can meet
the need for sustained, drastic emission reductions. Value chains that disrupt
existing industries and create new ones will spring up—industries based,
for instance, on the large-scale supply of biomass to power plants and on
second-generation biofuels. New business models that reward suppliers
and end users in the power and transport sectors for consuming less energy
will be as important as new technologies.
Third, public policy and the widespread belief that higher energy prices
are here to stay are driving both of these developments. The coming economy-
wide discontinuity may be the first one driven largely by regulation.