"LONDON - The number of fossil fuel companies setting net-zero emissions targets has risen sharply over the past year, but most fail to address key concerns, making them "largely meaningless", a report showed on Monday.

Some 75 of the world's largest 112 fossil fuel companies have now committed to reaching net-zero - the point at which greenhouse gas emissions are negated by deep cuts in output elsewhere and methods to absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide.

That's up from just 51 a year ago, according to the assessment of publicly available data by Net Zero Tracker, run in part by the Britain-based Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit and the University of Oxford.

But most targets do not fully cover or lack transparency on Scope 3 emissions — which include the use of a company's products, the biggest source of emissions for fossil fuel companies — or don't include short-term reduction plans, the report added."

Gloria Dickie and Simon Jessop report for Reuters June 12, 2023. [2]