Majority of global businesses set to miss 2050 net zero goals

Almost a decade on from the Paris Climate Agreement, the world’s largest companies are still struggling to do their part – despite years of promises. While a new study from Accenture suggests decarbonisation is “gaining momentum” to that end, it means that only 16% of companies are actually on target to meet their 2050 net zero goals.
Despite making early progress on the decarbonisation of the economy, the UK’s efforts to remodel itself as a net zero market have stalled in recent years. And while the wider continent of Europe still holds a ‘leadership’ position in terms of early decarbonisation, the majority of its companies are also likely to miss their net zero targets now.
According to the fourth edition of Accenture’s ‘Destination Net Zero’ report, just 21% of companies on the continent are currently on-track to reach net zero. While only 33% of European G2000 companies are reporting rising emissions, then, progress is simply too slow, at present.
Further afield, however, the picture is even bleaker. Dragging the global average preparedness down to just 16%, Asia Pacific hosts a meagre 11% of companies which will meet their 2050 goals. Meanwhile, the rest of the world, and North America only have 17% of companies able to reach those targets – and 42% saying their emissions are still growing. With the change of power in the USA since the Presidential election, and the inbound Donald Trump having previously demonstrated distaste for net zero goals, that picture looks unlikely to improve in the near future.
Commenting on the findings, Stephanie Jamison, Accenture’s global resources industry practices and sustainability services lead, said, “[To reach 2050 net-zero goals], all of us need to move faster, together, to reinvent sustainable value chains using deep collaboration and transformative technologies.”
Accenture’s report also shows that many companies are still failing to account for their indirect emissions. The number of companies with net-zero targets that included all scopes – 1, 2 and 3 – remained stagnant from 2023-24 at 37%, in contrast to firms which had net-zero emissions targets that included at least scope 1 and scope 2 emissions, or those within operational control. To that end, a solid majority of 65% of companies now have at least operational targets in place, up 11% from last year and 26% points from 2021.
For companies in many industries, scope 3 emissions typically account for a large proportion of total emissions. For instance, financial services and consumer goods companies have small scope 1 and 2 footprints relative to their scope 3 emissions, making their scope 3 targets critical to their decarbonisation efforts.