11 December 2006MinewebBrad Watts
Mining giants Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton and BlueScope Steel were among six listed Australian companies at risk from the serious impact of climate change, a new study has shown. Research by banker Citigroup showed the emissions-intensive companies, listed on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) top-100 listed companies, were most at risk to climate change. The mining companies that could be most affected included Rio Tinto, BHP and BlueScope Steel, Caltex, Iluka and OneSteel, according to the research titled Climate Change - An assessment of risks and opportunities. The report, released this week, said climate change affected companies' profitability due to the cost of potentially pricing carbon and climate impacts. BlueScope Steel was the most emissions-intensive company which was double the next companies, Iluka, OneSteel and AGL and Alumina, when levels of carbon dioxide production for each $10,000 market of capitalisation were compared. "Those at risk include emissions-intensive companies, facilities particularly exposed to severe weather damage, agriculture and water-intensive industries exposed to drought, and in the long term insurers that may misprice catastrophe risk," the report said. Citigroup Investment Research managing director Bruce Rolph said some of Australia's biggest companies were recognising the importance of climate change. "Some of the big resource companies are taking it seriously - both the issues to do with emissions but also the understanding what physical risks there may be to their portfolio of assets," Mr Rolph said. He said Rio, BHP and Alumina were among companies most aware of climate change issues and all had strategies in place to reduce emissions. Mineweb always carries details of at least 20 independently written top mining, mining finance, metals and mining sector analysis articles on its homepage as well as a fast news feed to keep you right up to date with what is going on in the mining and metals sectors worldwide. These are continuously updated through the day. Click here to go to Mineweb's home page and access the latest news and comments on developments in mining and metals worldwide.
