Two high-profile trade associations have cautioned the Department of Labor from issuing new climate-specific regulations for retirement plan fiduciaries.

The Labor Department in February issued a request for information on what it should do to “protect retirement savings and pensions from risks associated with changes in climate.” The RFI follows a May 2021 executive order from President Joe Biden that directed federal agencies to assess and mitigate financial risks related to climate change.

The RFI featured a host of questions on which the public could provide feedback, including:

Should the EBSA collect data on climate-related financial risk for plans?
Should administrators of ERISA plans be required to publicly report on the steps they take to manage climate-related financial risk and the results and outcomes of any such steps taken, in a form that is more easily accessible to the public, and timelier, than the Form 5500?
Should the Labor Department’s Employee Benefits Security Administration sponsor and publish research to improve data and analytics that ERISA plan fiduciaries could use to evaluate climate-related financial risks?
Comments were due Monday, and while the Labor Department will post more comments with varying opinions on its website in the coming days, letters filed by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association and ERISA Industry Committee provided similar top-line feedback.

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