Currently in Toronto— April 12th, 2022

The weather, currently.

Here comes the warmest day of the month so far. The isolated showers overnight tonight will taper off by dawn on Tuesday. The wakeup temperature will be near 5°C with a beautiful spring day on the way. Expect mainly sunny skies and a high of 15°C. That is the warmest we have seen so far this month and 4 degrees above the seasonal norm. The wind will be light from the wsw at 15km/h. Tuesday night: cloudy periods and mild with a low of 6°C. —Anwar Knight

What you need to know, currently.

“Eco-conscious” fashion brands, like Nike and H&M, can continue to increase their greenhouse gas emissions, despite the sustainable and climate-positive image they’ve been displaying to consumers.

The fashion industry is greenhouse gas intensive, with its estimated emissions ranging from 2 to 8 percent of the global total. So, many brands have signed up to the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), a nonprofit that helps companies self-disclose their environmental impacts, in an effort to be more transparent.

However, according to reporting by the Guardian, the fashion industry’s true environmental impacts are being hidden behind a sneaky scorekeeping system, where fashion brands’ gross global emissions are calculated against total revenue.

In other words, as long as a brand’s increase in emissions is less than their increase in total revenue each year, their annual carbon dioxide emissions are marked as a decrease and the CDP gives the brand a high score.

Nike and H&M, for example, both received A minuses in both 2017 and 2018. Last year, in 2021, Nike was awarded an A minus, while H&M got a B.

The Greenhouse Gas Protocol, which sets the standard for measuring emissions, categorizes them into Scope 1) emissions that directly come from the company burning fossil fuels; Scope 2) emissions that come from purchased energy, like electricity, heat and cooling; and Scope 3) all the other indirect emissions that occur.

For the CDP report, companies are only required to provide their gross global Scope 1 and 2 emissions and then self-report whether the combined emissions are more or less than their revenue increase.

Nike’s self-reported carbon dioxide emissions increased 164% from 2015 to 2021, from 17,975 metric tons of carbon dioxide to 47,398, respectively, according to the Guardian. Similarly, H&M’s increased from 10,723 in 2015 to 11,973 in 2021 – a 12% increase.

Therefore, a relative decoupling is occurring, in which companies work to increase their efficiency, rather than decrease their emissions.

As a result, the planet suffers.