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

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.