Editor’s note: This is the final story in a series about trucking companies’ clashes with investors over environmental reporting and goal-setting proposals. Read previous coverage in which Paccar, Knight-Swift Transportation Holdings and Old Dominion Freight Line boards urged investors to vote against the measures.
Shareholders of three trucking industry heavyweights rejected environmental proposals seeking to enhance company policies and reporting of their direct and indirect impacts.
Votes at Paccar, Old Dominion Freight Line and Knight-Swift Transportation Holdings shot down attempts to change how the companies handle their environmental goals and transparency.
The OEM, LTL and TL shareholders made their cases for why they felt the transportation and manufacturing businesses should enhance their environmental, social and governance policies.
But company boards recommended voting against the moves, defending their environmental initiatives and efforts and suggesting the proposals were not in sync with their businesses.
At Paccar, a showdown repeated between management investment firm Calvert Research and Management and the OEM. The proposal called for producing annual reports that detail how the company’s lobbying efforts align with Paris Agreement emissions goals.
But rather than turning the tables this time around, opposition widened: Nearly 312 million shares voted against the proposal, while 129 million shares voted for it. A year ago, the proposal drew nearly 206 million shares in favor, versus nearly 228 million rejecting it.
At Knight-Swift, investors firmly opposed a measure from an investor that called for issuing greenhouse gas reduction targets.
Old Dominion shareholders similarly rejected a proposal by the nonprofit As You Sow that called for the carrier to hold itself more accountable by creating a climate transition plan and reporting on its progress.
Kelly Poole, As You Sow’s climate and energy coordinator, said the group is pleased with investors voting 24.4% in favor of the proposal, despite the measure falling short. The support signaled shareholders’ desire for better climate risk management from Old Dominion, she said.
As You Sow filed the measure on behalf of a large cap index fund connected to Amalgamated Bank. While the results could warrant a refiling, advocates plan to use the outcome to continue engaging with the carrier, Poole said.
“We believe the vote is high enough to warrant action from the Company and will be monitoring the Company’s disclosures for updates to its climate transition plan,” she wrote in an email. “We continue to believe that setting emission reduction targets is a necessary step for the company.”
