{"id":285,"date":"2018-04-09T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-04-09T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/uncategorized\/285\/press-release-alberta-securities-commission-reviewing-greenpeace-complaint-of-inadequate-disclosure-of-climate-risk-by-kinder-morgan\/"},"modified":"2025-07-02T04:22:25","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T08:22:25","slug":"press-release-alberta-securities-commission-reviewing-greenpeace-complaint-of-inadequate-disclosure-of-climate-risk-by-kinder-morgan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/press-release\/285\/press-release-alberta-securities-commission-reviewing-greenpeace-complaint-of-inadequate-disclosure-of-climate-risk-by-kinder-morgan\/","title":{"rendered":"PRESS RELEASE: Alberta Securities Commission reviewing Greenpeace complaint of inadequate disclosure of climate risk by Kinder Morgan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>9 April 2018 (TORONTO) \u2014<\/strong> The Alberta Securities Commission has agreed to review a complaint from Greenpeace Canada alleging incomplete disclosure of climate-related risks in Kinder Morgan Canada\u2019s (KML) first Annual Report. Under Alberta\u2019s securities law, a failure to fully disclose risks to shareholders can result in fraud charges or class action lawsuits.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe opposition of the BC government is only one ripple in a sea of troubles facing Kinder Morgan Canada. In its report to shareholders, the company admits that climate change threatens its facilities and that the alliance of Indigenous and environmental climate protectors may block construction of its Trans Mountain Expansion Pipeline,\u201d said Keith Stewart, Senior Energy Strategist with Greenpeace Canada. \u201cDespite these disclosures, we believe the company is still underplaying the risk that a successful transition to a low-carbon economy would pose to their business model.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Greenpeace Canada presented its arguments in a 13-page briefing note that evaluated the climate risk disclosures in KML\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/services.cds.ca\/docs_csn\/02730565-00000001-00042650-i%40%23Sedar%23Kinder%23Q4%23Form10K-PDF.pdf\">2017 annual repor<\/a>t against those recommended by the Financial Stability Board\u2019s Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD). The complaint was initially filed with the Ontario Securities Commission on March 27, who passed it on to the Alberta Securities Commission on the grounds that the ASC is the principal regulator for KML. The ASC notified Greenpeace Canada at 6 PM ET on Friday, April 6 that they were reviewing the complaint.<\/p>\n<p>Kinder Morgan began disclosing climate-related risks following a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/news\/british-columbia\/alberta-regulator-to-review-greenpeaces-kinder-morgan-ipo-challenge\/article35055396\/\">2017 challenge by Greenpeace Canada<\/a> of the prospectus underlying the company\u2019s $1.75 billion share offering. In its 2017 Annual Report, Kinder Morgan Canada disclosed that:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Opposition to the Trans Mountain Expansion Pipeline (including opposition motivated by a concern over the related increase in greenhouse gas emissions) could lead to changes in public opinion, government policy, blockades or protests that could result in delays or even the cancellation of the project<\/li>\n<li>Technology and policy changes (including progress on meeting the Paris Agreement\u2019s decarbonization targets) could result in decreased global demand for hydrocarbons, which would negatively impact KML directly and could negatively impact KML customers so that they are unable to honour their contracts with KML.<\/li>\n<li>Rising sea levels and extreme weather pose direct physical risks to KML facilities (pipelines and oil terminals) and may result in an increased risk of accidents or construction delays. There is also a risk that the company\u2019s insurance premiums will increase, or that it may not be able to purchase insurance for facilities vulnerable to increasingly extreme weather.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Key elements missing from KML\u2019s climate-related disclosures in its 2017 Annual Report include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>No climate-related legal risks are disclosed. KML does acknowledge that financial distress of its customers could prevent them from fulfilling their contracts, but does not disclose that oil companies that are confirmed shippers on KML pipelines (and\/or their parent companies) are currently subject to lawsuits and fraud investigations related to climate change. According to the TCFD, litigation risk is likely to increase as the value of loss and damage arising from climate change grows.<\/li>\n<li>No low-carbon scenario are disclosed. \u00a0The TCFD recommended that all organizations exposed to climate-related risks use scenario analysis to help inform their strategic and financial planning process \u2014 and to disclose how resilient their strategies are to a range of plausible climate-related scenarios, including a scenario where we succeed in keeping warming well below 2 degree Celsius (as agreed to in the Paris climate agreement). KML acknowledges that it is exposed to a range of climate-related risks but does not provide a coherent assessment of how these risks inform their planning or how resilient their business strategy is to a low-carbon future.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The TCFD recommendations have been supported by major Canadian investors such as the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, the Ontario Teachers\u2019 Pension Plan, OPTrust, the Caisse de d\u00e9p\u00f4t et placement du Qu\u00e9bec and the British Columbia Investment Management Corporation, as well as global investors like BlackRock. Canadian security regulators, including the Alberta Securities Commission, launched a review of corporate disclosure of the risks and financial impacts associated with climate change in March 2017. The results of that review <a href=\"https:\/\/www.securities-administrators.ca\/aboutcsa.aspx?id=1677\">were published last week<\/a>, and regulators have indicated that they are considering new climate risk disclosure requirements.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat is Kinder Morgan\u2019s Plan B for the scenario where the world stops global warming?,\u201d said Stewart.\u201dWhether it\u2019s acknowledging the threat posed by the lawsuits alleging oil companies hid what they knew about climate change, or spelling out what management would do if new technology and climate policies reduce the demand for oil, Kinder Morgan needs to come clean with its investors and the public.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>&#8211; 30 \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Link:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Greenpeace Canada\u2019s review of Kinder Morgan Canada\u2019s climate risk disclosure is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/static\/planet4-canada-stateless\/2018\/06\/Review-of-Kinder-Morgan-climate-risk-disclosure.pdf\">available here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For more information:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Keith Stewart, Senior Energy Strategist, Greenpeace Canada, 416-659-0294.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>9 April 2018 (TORONTO) \u2014 The Alberta Securities Commission has agreed to review a complaint from Greenpeace Canada alleging incomplete disclosure of climate-related risks in Kinder Morgan Canada\u2019s (KML) first&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":1874,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"p4_og_title":"","p4_og_description":"","p4_og_image":"","p4_og_image_id":"","p4_seo_canonical_url":"","p4_campaign_name":"","p4_local_project":"","p4_basket_name":"","p4_department":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[32,23],"p4-page-type":[14],"class_list":["post-285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-climate","tag-oil","tag-climate","p4-page-type-press-release"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=285"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71149,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285\/revisions\/71149"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=285"},{"taxonomy":"p4-page-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/p4-page-type?post=285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}