The Vice President, Public Affairs and Chief ESG Officer provides senior leadership on PotlatchDeltic’s ESG reporting and initiatives. Updates are provided to the Board of Directors at least twice a year regarding ESG strategies, initiatives, and analysis, including climate risks and opportunities. The Board oversees PotlatchDeltic’s environmental management, social responsibility, health and safety, and corporate governance policies and practices.

The Vice President, Public Affairs and Chief ESG Officer regularly provides information to and leads discussion with the Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer, and management regarding the continuous improvement of our ESG strategic development.

An ESG Management Committee consisting of management across business units and corporate functions meets twice a year. The committee deliberates medium and long-term ESG strategies, addresses concerns and opportunities, evaluates disclosures, and fosters continuous improvement.

An ESG Working Group meets at least quarterly and drives the ESG strategies, data collection, analysis, systems, and goals. Experts from the ESG Working Group lead the greenhouse gas and carbon sequestration and storage analysis, the climate risks and opportunities analysis and the materiality assessment process. The ESG Working Group includes a wide breadth of in-house experts including representatives from forest management, biodiversity, human resources, wood products environmental management, legal and compliance, safety, public affairs, and ESG.

The ESG Working Group works closely with employees across organization functions and geographies to support the development of ESG programs and initiatives. Day-to-day ownership and implementation of our environmental, social and governance strategies resides at the business operation and function level with oversight by environmental, safety, human resources, and public policy managers. Carbon and Climate teams have been established across the organization to evaluate opportunities for GHG reduction initiatives and to establish and track ESG targets and goals.

ESG programs are integrated into existing environmental management and safety systems, supported through annual internal and external audits, regional and divisional management reviews, safety team processes, setting of annual goals and objectives, annual training, and capital budgeting plans. Audit findings, stakeholder feedback, site inspection results, and hazard reporting are all reviewed for trends as part of continual improvement that also helps refine our ESG strategy.

Environmental management and ESG risks and opportunities, including climate-related issues, are coordinated within our annual Enterprise Risk Management framework. Change management procedures are in place to ensure that proposed changes and capital projects are evaluated for their potential ESG impacts as part of the approval process. Once identified, these impacts are mitigated or managed to ensure alignment with our ESG strategies. Employees participate in ESG training and reviews across business units.

We utilize the expertise of external research organizations like the National Council for Air and Stream Improvement (NCASI) for support of ESG initiatives.