The U.S. Climate Reporting Infrastructure Is Being Built: Deadlines, Markets, and Supply Chains Stop Waiting for Action From Washington

Over the past two issues of Sustainability Highlights, we've tracked how sustainability policy is decentralizing. Instead of federal agencies, policy action has been moving to courtrooms, statehouses, and corporate boardrooms. This week, the picture has shifted again, with a rise in action to build infrastructure for climate policy even while regulatory fights drag on.

In this week’s top stories:

• California finally sets a specific deadline for GHG emissions reporting by more than 4,000 companies
• Two U.S. states and a Canadian province release a draft agreement to link carbon markets across borders
• Major pharmaceutical companies are embedding sustainability requirements directly into supplier contracts, effectively requiring companies throughout their value chains to report emissions and more
• New polling shows that 80% of Americans — including a substantial majority of Republicans — expect both government and business to act on climate

One big take-away is that mandated state-level disclosure is now operational. As reported by ESG News, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) approved the implementing regulation for SB 253, setting August 10, 2026 as the first deadline for companies with more than $1 billion in revenue to report Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions. That deadline is now just five months away. More than 4,000 U.S. companies — roughly 60% of them headquartered outside of the State of California — are expected to fall in scope, with Scope 3 reporting to follow in 2027. CARB has signaled it will exercise enforcement discretion for the first cycle, focusing on good-faith compliance.

States are also taking initiative to expand and stabilize trade in carbon emissions. ESG Dive reports that Washington, California, and the Province of Québec released a draft agreement to link their cap-and-trade programs into a single carbon market — potentially operational as early as 2027. California and Québec connected their programs back in 2014, creating the largest trading market for carbon emissions in North America and the third-largest such market in the world. Adding Washington State would expand that market further and bring greater price stability for traded carbon emissions. The draft agreement is open for public comment through May 1, 2026.

Customers are also joining the list of those influencing sustainability expectations. In a new resource paper, G&A Institute examines how major pharmaceutical companies are integrating climate and sustainability requirements directly into their procurement strategies, pushing Tier 1 suppliers to disclose emissions, set science-based targets, and respond to platforms like CDP and EcoVadis.

With Scope 3 emissions representing as much as 88% emissions in pharma, this is an area where the rubber meets the road for supply chain decarbonization. For Tier 1 suppliers to large pharma customers, sustainability is no longer a siloed EHS exercise — it's a company-wide business imperative. G&A's team is working with suppliers across industries on GHG accounting, SBTi target-setting, CDP responses, and EcoVadis surveys — reach out at info@ga-institute.com to learn how we can help.

What makes all of this more striking is the public backdrop. As Trellis reports, a GlobeScan survey of more than 30,000 people finds that eight in 10 Americans believe government has a responsibility to address climate change — a view that holds across party lines, with a significant percentage of Republicans in agreement. Nearly as many say companies share that responsibility.

At a time when federal actors are dismantling their own climate authority, public expectations are moving in the opposite direction. For professionals navigating this landscape, this issue of Sustainability Highlights covers additional developments like South Korea's mandatory sustainability reporting timeline, the EU's proposed Industrial Accelerator Act, the relaunch of the Net-Zero Asset Managers initiative, and the growing role of AI in sustainability solutions

This is just the introduction of G&A's Sustainability Highlights newsletter this week. Click here to view the full issue.