For energy, no more 'business as usual'

Sustainability and “green” business have become common topics in many corporate boardrooms, but there’s one issue that most firms have all but ignored, at least publicly: the growing risk of an energy crunch. As we enter 2011, however, that’s an issue they can no longer afford to dismiss.

This past year saw organisations like the US and German militaries — hardly tree-huggers — both prepare studies on the implications of reaching a peak in global oil production. And a small but influential group of British businesses, coming together as the Industry Task Force on Peak Oil & Energy Security (ITPOES), has been warning for several years now that a significant energy crunch is not only likely, but approaching sooner than many might expect.

Which makes it all the more remarkable, and worrisome, that many of the corporations that are otherwise leaders in sustainability have until now had so little to say about the issue. Companies like GE, Dell, IBM, Cisco and Siemens talk plenty in their annual reports and corporate social responsibility reports about reducing carbon emissions, managing water consumption, boosting use of renewable energy and so on, but phrases like “peak oil” or “energy security” rarely come up.

That will have to change in the coming year.

The Virgin Group, Solarcentury, Arup and other members of ITPOES foresee an oil crunch by 2015. The US Joint Forces Command conveyed an even greater sense of urgency in its Joint Operating Environment 2010 report, warning that the world’s surplus oil production capacity “could entirely disappear” by 2012. These are time-frames that will demand serious planning by both government officials and business leaders in the year to come, especially with oil again flirting with triple-digit prices. Those that put it off much longer could quickly find their existence in jeopardy.

For 2011, “business as usual” planning will no longer be an option.