The pursuit of reduced energy emissions portfolios from institutional investors is putting pressure on the efficiency of energy transition plans from investee companies.

Despite a growing uncertainty caused by pushback against an environmental, social and governance driven investment lens, companies and investors need to think about environmental causes with a long-term risk perspective, says Sagar Kancharla, director of energy transition advisory and investments at WSP Canada.

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“There’s definitely an urgency, but I think people are still trying to see how they can work around the constraints that exist and still try to ensure that [they aren’t] losing focus on long-term goals.”

He leverages his expertise to advise a variety of interested parties — including institutional investors, policy- makers involved in the energy value chain and corporations — on how to shift away from high carbon fuels and technologies. It all starts by identifying what the big sources of energy causing emissions are and understanding what the energy requirements of the business in question.

Companies typically first consider consuming less energy to reduce emissions as a starting point, he says, followed by considering all the processes and operations that can be electrified. This process leads to potential changes in energy use with renewable options like solar, wind or renewable natural gas.

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“You start looking at ways that you can electrify the operations, . . . then if it’s not meeting your emissions target, then you start looking at substitution.”

Divestment of carbon-intensive assets is another strategy available, he adds, but only in rare cases where it’s crucial for a firm to meet its decarbonization objective. Before a firm considers divesting from these assets, there’s also the possibility to buy some carbon offsets.

“It really starts with understanding the inventory of your emissions,” he says. “What are the sources having a forecast over a horizon and go through these processes to understand your final achievements.”

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The World Energy Council’s 2024 comparative analysis of G7 countries on renewable energy share, CO₂ emissions reduction and energy dependency patterns found Canada is near the bottom of the list with roughly 19.6 per cent of its total energy derived from renewable resources. Carbon emissions in Canada have only declined by 10.4 per cent.

Kancharla sees Canadian industries as aware of the energy transition requirements due in part to government policies but there’s still a long road ahead to implement the suggested changes from an energy security and affordability perspective.

Even though ESG may have its detractors, he adds, sustainability analysis, emissions inventory and how a firm goes about decommission are all very relevant. In 2024, a new record for global low-carbon energy transition investments was achieved, growing by 11 per cent to reach US$2.1 trillion in 2024, according to BloombergNEF.

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