Catherine Atkin, co-founder and director of Carbon Accountable, was one of the architects behind SB 253 — California's landmark climate disclosure law. In this episode, Catherine takes us back to the drafting table: why mandatory disclosure was necessary, why California was the right venue, and how SB 253 was built to work alongside (not against) the GHG Protocol, CSRD, and IFRS S2.

We dig into where CARB's current rulemaking stands on phasing in Scope 3 categories, how the GHG Protocol's move toward primary-data requirements might interact with SB 253, and why Catherine sees disclosure as a necessary (if insufficient) precondition for real decarbonization. Catherine also shares her work with the Task Force for Corporate Action Transparency (TCAT), helping companies get credit for climate action beyond their own scopes 1, 2, and 3 — and closes with her five-year vision for what "routine" climate reporting could look like in California.

Sponsored by North Star Carbon & Impact.

Stephanie Jones, Senior Attorney for Climate Risk at Environmental Defense Fund, helps unpack California's SB 253, one of the country's leading corporate climate disclosure laws, and where CARB's rulemaking stands heading into its final stretch this year.

We cover:

• What SB 253 actually requires and who it covers
• Why emission factor quality and transparency matter so much for useful scope 3 reporting
• The importance of Scope 3 reporting across all categories
• How CARB can adapt standards in response to future protocol changes
• How companies and practitioners can still weigh in before CARB presents its regulation to the board this December

Stephanie also points listeners to EDF's Net Zero Action Accelerator at netzeroaction.org for practical resources on measuring, disclosing, and reducing value chain greenhouse gas emissions.

This episode is brought to you by North Star Carbon & Impact, the carbon and sustainability management platform built by sustainability professionals for sustainability professionals.

"If we're just addressing greenhouse gas emissions, it's like playing defense and expecting to win the game. You also have to play offense."

Dr. Cheryl Baldwin, Vice President of Sustainability Consulting at Pure Strategies, argues that companies hesitate on nature because they expect the same multi-year climb carbon accounting was. She thinks that expectation is wrong, and that it's what keeps most companies stuck. In her experience, Pure Strategies has yet to work with a company that couldn't connect something already underway to nature.

Cheryl has built nature and climate strategies for companies across food, retail, and consumer goods. She helped build Toyota Motor North America's biodiversity and land strategy, developed sustainability goals for TAZO, built a sustainable packaging strategy for Walmart, and authored The 10 Principles of Food Industry Sustainability.

In this episode we cover:

• The most common buckets where nature work already exists: philanthropy and purpose, operations, products and sourcing, and climate
• Why the Global Biodiversity Framework is the nature equivalent of the Paris Agreement
• Translating nature targets into three business-actionable areas: protect, restore, sustainably manage
• Why a climate strategy isn't a complete strategy without a nature strategy alongside it

Find Cheryl at purestrategies.com and on LinkedIn. The Nature Navigator report, Planet-Forward Strategies, and the Nature Action Forum for Business are all available on the Pure Strategies site.

This podcast is brought to you by North Star Carbon & Impact, the carbon and sustainability management platform built by sustainability professionals, for sustainability professionals. North Star helps companies simplify GHG accounting, improve data quality, and stay audit ready across Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions. Visit northstarcarbon.com to learn more or request a demo.