Kotamarthi featured at data science webinar aimed at developing ESG standards for corporations
Rao Kotamarthi, Chief Scientist and head of Climate and Earth System Science in the Environmental Science Division, was one of four featured speakers for a webinar entitled “Climate Change: Developing Common Standards and Data to Evaluate Investment Risk and Corporate Performance.” The webinar, held on Thursday, December 2, was part of a data science series hosted by Ropes & Gray LLP law firm and Mass Insight Global Partnerships, supported by the D’Amore-McKim School of Business at Northeastern University and other members of the academic, business, and government communities. The series also included topics on data innovation agendas to accelerate solutions in cancer care and data privacy and cybersecurity.
According to host Michael Littenberg, partner at Ropes & Gray LLP, the webinar goal was “a discussion aimed at the role of data and data analytics in making some of the key decisions of our day.”
Speakers included Kotamarthi, Robert J. Jackson, Jr., Pierrepont Family Professor of Law, NYU School of Law; John (Jianqiu) Bai, Associate Professor of Finance, D’Amore-McKim School of Business, Northeastern University, and Sam Tortora, Global Head of Aladdin Sustainability, BlackRock.
The discussion was timely as companies are increasingly judged — by investors, risk analysts, regulators, and consumers — on their ESG standards. The webinar focused on what role data and data analytics are playing in the evaluation of a company’s ESG performance, ESG-related risks, and efforts to implement effective ESG programs, with a specific focus on the impact of climate on investment risk.
Littenburg posed questions to the speakers about how data analytics and models are used to assess ESG risk and performance; how estimates and assumptions are used to fill data gaps; how investors, lenders, insurers, and regulators employ data and data analytics to make real-world decisions; what role government should play in regulating ESG ratings and data providers, and how data and data analytics can play a role in helping to address climate change.