Sustainability and Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) Practice

Companies throughout the United States and abroad are increasingly focusing on business risks and opportunities related to sustainability and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors, including climate change. While these issues are not new, they are receiving elevated C-suite attention due to multiple forces: intensifying compliance obligations, growing investor and supply chain pressures, and expanding significance in transactions. Businesses in the manufacturing, energy, mining, finance, and other sectors are prioritizing ESG considerations in the full range of their corporate dealings. Lewis Brisbois’s Sustainability and ESG practice draws upon sophisticated expertise from a seasoned, multi-disciplinary complement of practitioners across the firm to provide clients with an integrated problem-solving team targeted to their specific opportunities and risk mitigation needs.

Key aspects of this practice include:

Advising clients on corporate governance matters, including human rights statements and anti-slavery and other supply chain policies;
Working with clients on compliance with ESG and climate change-related legal requirements under federal, state, and foreign law;
Assisting companies to optimize knowledge of evolving standards for disclosure and reporting standards, as the international community moves to harmonize methodologies for quantifying positive and negative impacts throughout supply chains;
Representing clients in shareholder suits;
Advising businesses on transactional concerns, including due diligence valuation, and risks in acquisitions, investments, and lending;
Working with clients on risk mitigation approaches, including insurance coverage;
Counseling clients on investigations, including potential fraud and anti-corruption allegations, as well as crisis management strategies;
Advising financial institutions on requirements to assess climate-related financial risks that would affect the stability of banks and their borrowers;
Assisting clients with tax risk management matters;
Advising corporations on employment issues implicated by ESG considerations;
Assisting clients with managing data protection and cybersecurity concerns; and
Working with companies on government relations strategies that optimize business goals.

The members of our Sustainability and ESG Practice work with clients to achieve their business objectives in a thorough, expedient, and cost-effective manner. Upon request, we will be happy to provide references and additional information concerning the specific matters that we have handled in this area.