ESG Talks

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler introduces Arianne Schreier, an Associate on KBRA’s ESG team, who will be taking over as host of the ESG Talks podcast as Emilie transitions to a new role within KBRA. The two will also be joined by Pat Welch, KBRA’s Chief ESG and Ratings Policy Officer, to chat about the outlook for ESG over the next year and how KBRA’s approach makes the firm uniquely prepared for what’s to come.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team chats with Ken Egan, from KBRA’s Sovereigns team. Ken and Emilie recently published a research report, “European Climate Transition: Cost Burden and Risk of Slowing Progress.” The piece provides an overview of the EU’s climate transition plan and then delves into the cost for the region to transition, including at the member-state level. Amid high inflation and the increased cost of living in the EU, it also highlights the growing backlash against climate regulation in the region, given the high cost of implementation and the often-burdensome regulation requirements. Ken and Emilie talk through the key takeaways from the piece and go through the implications of the report’s findings.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team interviews Dr. Greg Characklis. Dr. Characklis serves as William R. Kenan, Jr. Distinguished Professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences and Engineering at the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill. He is also Director of the Center on Financial Risk in Environmental Systems, a research center that bridges the Gillings School of Global Public Health and the UNC Institute for the Environment, and is focused on translating environmental events such as floods, droughts and heatwaves into financial outcomes. The Center is currently engaged in projects funded by National Science Foundation, Department of Energy and the state of North Carolina to quantify the financial risks of extreme environmental events in a number of economic sectors, including water utilities, power utilities, agriculture, inland navigation (like the Mississippi River) and real estate. The Center’s research is highly interdisciplinary, drawing on the natural sciences, engineering and economics to develop an improved understanding of environmental financial risk, as well as new tools and strategies for managing it.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Pat Welch, KBRA’s Chief ESG and Ratings Policy Officer, interviews Michael Kashani, Managing Director and Head of ESG Credit at Apollo. Michael is responsible for supporting ESG integration across the Credit business as well as further incorporating ESG into Apollo’s lending and other non-control investments processes. Michael currently represents Apollo across several industry initiatives, including as the inaugural Steering Committee Chair of the ESG Integrated Disclosure Project (IDP). The ESG IDP is an industry initiative bringing together leading lenders in the private credit and syndicated loan markets to improve transparency and accountability. The group’s goal is to promote greater harmonization and consistency of disclosure of key ESG indicators by borrowers in private credit and syndicated loan transactions.

In this episode, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team, chats with Gordon Kerr, KBRA’s Head of European Research and host of KBRA’s Conversations in European Credit podcast. Gordon and Emilie chat about the most recent United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP28). This year’s event took place in Dubai and ran from the 30th of November through the 12th of December. Emilie and Gordon give an overview of the key takeaways of COP28 including fossil fuel interests at the event, discussions around carbon capture and storage, and divisions over the language of the final text.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team, interviews Lisa Peto from Mindset. Mindset is a bipartisan public policy firm that blends thoughtful research and analysis, strategic advisory services, and sophisticated advocacy to address the challenges and opportunities their clients encounter in Washington. Given the continued focus on ESG in public policy circles, Mindset also helps its clients navigate the evolving suite of ESG policy issues, leveraging their deep expertise in financial services, energy, environment, and other relevant policy arenas. Emilie and Lisa talk about the state of ESG disclosure regulation in the U.S. including California’s recent climate disclosure bill as well as the status of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)’s climate disclosure proposal.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Luigi Griffo, Senior Director of KBRA’s European Investor Relations team, interviews Sabrina Fox, CEO of the European Leveraged Finance Association (ELFA). ELFA is a buyside-only trade association that acts as a voice for the investor community and seeks to create a more transparent, efficient, and resilient leveraged finance market. Sabrina is a recognized expert in European leveraged finance and is focused improving disclosure standards and educating market participants on the importance of lender protections in documentation. Luigi and Sabrina chat about ESG in leveraged finance, the challenges and opportunities in the market, and ELFA’s upcoming Annual Conference on 14 November in London.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team interviews Kyle Purcell and Ben Vivari, Co-Founders of Till Investors. Till Investors empowers its audience with straightforward guidance on impact investing, working with both investors and organizations to find investments that fit their values and mission. This fall, Kyle and Ben are releasing their first book, “Sustainable Investing: An ESG Starter Kit for Everyday Investors.” Emilie, Kyle, and Ben chat about the current challenges in ESG investing and how Till investors works to align its clients’ interests with their ESG goals.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team interviews Curtis Shuck, founder and Chairman of the Well Done Foundation. The Well Done Foundation’s is working to fight climate change through plugging orphaned or abandoned oil and gas wells. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates there are approximately 3.5 million unplugged abandoned wells scattered throughout the United States. The Well Done Foundation works with farmers and landowners, local and state governments, corporations and not-for-profit organizations to locate abandoned wells, measure and document the CO2 emissions, then plug the wells and restore the surrounding surface area to its original state. For the past 30+ years, Curtis has passionately focused his extensive public service and private sector careers on Oil and Energy related transportation project development, capital project delivery and business development activities in the Pacific Northwest and the Mid‐Continent. Curtis founded the Well Done Foundation after seeing firsthand the impacts of orphaned and abandoned oil and gas wells on communities and the environment. For more information on the Well Done Foundation’s work, view the Smithsonian Channel’s episode highlighting abandoned oil wells.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team interviews Dr. Benjamin Cook, a Research Scientist at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, and adjunct Research Scientist at Columbia University’s Earth Institute. His research focuses on drought, hydroclimate, and interactions between the land surface and climate system. Emilie and Ben chat about his work at NASA and Columbia, his recent research publication on drought in the Western U.S., and what we can expect from the return of El Niño.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team, interviews Oli Newman, a Senior Credit Analyst at Fidelity International. Since joining Fidelity in March 2021, he has been responsible for the roll-out of the firmwide ESG framework across its Private Credit strategies, including CLO’s, European Loan Fund and Direct Lending Fund. Oli is also the Co-Chair of the European Leveraged Finance Association (ELFA)’s ESG Committee. This committee is focused on improving disclosure on ESG topics in the leveraged finance market and developing best practice guidance on ESG disclosures for sub-investment grade corporate borrowers. Oli and Emilie discuss the integration of ESG into Fidelity’s private credit strategies, his work on the ELFA ESG Committee, as well as KBRA and ELFA’s upcoming ESG event in London on 13th September, where he will be a panelist.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler from KBRA’s ESG team interviews President and CEO, Jim Nadler, and Pat Welch, Chief ESG and Ratings Policy Officer. With recent market developments and a move by some rating agencies away from ESG scoring systems, Jim and Pat discuss KBRA’s view on ESG scoring and the evolution of KBRA’s ESG philosophy. As a credit rating agency, KBRA remains steadfastly focused on analyzing the financial materiality of ESG factors and their relevance to credit today and in the future. KBRA’s position has long been that the process of merging ESG scoring into credit ratings muddles the purity of credit risk analysis by introducing ESG metrics that may have little to no financial materiality.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team, interviews Bruce Kahn. Dr. Kahn is an Adjunct Professor at Columbia University’s the Earth Institute, in their Sustainability Management program, and is also a Senior Portfolio Manager at Shelton Capital Management. He has an extensive background in investment management with an emphasis in sustainable investing, most notably at MSCI, Macquarie, Sustainable Insight Capital Management, Deutsche Asset Management, and Smith Barney. Bruce also served as the Chair of the Finance Committee of the Robert and Patricia Switzer Foundation for ten years and has served on numerous advisory boards across the Sustainable Investment industry, including the USSIF, SASB and NREL.

In this episode, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team speaks with Peter Giacone, Senior Managing Director, and Global Head of KBRA’s Insurance group. Peter and Emilie discuss a recent insurance headline: one of the largest home insurers in the U.S., State Farm, will stop offering new coverage in California because of increased catastrophe exposure. This news highlights the growing risks of climate change and increasingly severe weather events within the insurance sector. Peter also shares his perspective about possible longer-term trends. Join KBRA in partnership with the Bermuda Business Development Agency (BDA) for the Bermuda Climate Summit 2023. Learn more here. RSVP today for KBRA's private luncheon in Bermuda here.

In this episode, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team speaks with Joan Feldbaum-Vidra, Senior Managing Director and Head of KBRA’s Sovereigns ratings group. As KBRA has been monitoring and following trends in global environmental regulation, particularly developments in the EU and U.S., Joan and Emilie chat about the acceleration in global green industrial spending. Joan also provides the macroeconomic context and background information on the political economy as countries vie to win the green technology race. They touch on the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act, the EU Green Deal, the EU Green Deal Industrial Plan, the U.S. Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and the CHIPS Act in both the U.S. and the EU.

In this episode, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team, speaks with Gordon Kerr, KBRA’s Head of European Research, and Karim Nassif, a Senior Director on the European Project Finance and Infrastructure team. The three chat about a recent KBRA research piece, which provided an overview of the European Green Deal Industrial Plan. This research piece is the second report in KBRA’s series covering ESG regulatory updates in the EU. Gordon, Karim, and Emilie discuss the main policy proposals under the plan: the Net-Zero Industry Act, the European Hydrogen Bank, the Critical Raw Materials Act, and the reform of the electricity market design. They also discuss the practical challenges and potential credit implications of the EU’s proposed plans.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Emilie Nadler, a Director on KBRA’s ESG team, interviews Hamish Jacobs, Co-Founder of the Good Fuel Group. Hamish founded the Good Fuel Group in 2011 to provide sustainability advisory and capital raising services to support companies on their transformation from a model of extraction to one that supports the global low carbon transition. Hamish was previously Head of International Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility at Didi, a Chinese company providing app-based transportation services to Asian and Latin American markets. Hamish also worked at Coca Cola China as the Director of Sustainability. Hamish and Emilie discuss best practices for embedding sustainability into all aspects of a corporation and Hamish also shares corporate success stories in his 20+ year career in sustainability. This episode is in collaboration with KlimateNet, a peer-to-peer network that incentivizes and connects professionals working on projects that reduce or remove global greenhouse gas emissions.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Pat Welch, KBRA’s Chief ESG and Ratings Policy Officer, chats with Shannon Doherty, the Volunteer Program Director of Partnerships for Parks, a private-public partnership between NYC Parks and City Parks Foundation. Partnerships for Parks supports and champions neighborhood volunteers by giving them the tools they need to advocate and care for their community parks and green spaces. KBRA has been a supporter of Partnerships for Parks for the past few years and every year on Earth Day KBRA employees volunteer to help revitalize a park in NYC. Pat and Shannon talk about how Partnerships for Parks’ work fits into the ESG movement and discuss KBRA’s upcoming Earth Day event.

In this episode of ESG Talks, Gordon Kerr, KBRA’s Head of European Research and Emilie Nadler from KBRA’s ESG team discuss a recent KBRA research report, “An Overview of the European Green Deal,” which is the first piece in a series focusing on ESG-related regulation in Europe. Gordon and Emilie discuss details of various policies included under the Green Deal including the EU Climate Law, Fit for 55, the Just Transition Fund, and the Sustainable Finance strategy, which includes the EU Taxonomy, the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, and the Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation.

In this special cross-over episode of ESG Talks, we’re featuring an episode from KBRA’s podcast series, Conversations in European Credit. Listen in as Emilie Nadler from the ESG team chats with KBRA’s Head of European Research, Gordon Kerr, and Killian Walsh from KBRA’s European ABS ratings team. The three discuss the increase in solar photovoltaic (PV) funding in Europe and the potential for the use of securitisation to support the green transition.