The Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), a British non-governmental organization which collects and grades emissions data from large corporations, has awarded Great-West Lifeco's (GWL) operating companies Great-West Life, London Life, and Canada Life a 98B score for their 2014 submission.

The CDP score is normalized to a 100-point scale and reflects how well a company has answered a series of questions dealing with environmental issues, such as the way a company measures its carbon emissions, and the thoroughness of the information it collects on its climate-related actions. Companies provide, for example, data on the amount of waste going to landfill, water usage, and the intensity of greenhouse gas emissions.

Last year, the Great-West Lifeco insurers received a 67B score, which the CDP describes as "midrange". The CDP says a score of more than 70 indicates that "senior management understand the business issues related to climate change and are building climate related risks and opportunities into core business".

“For 2014 we built on our first-time submission and expanded the scope of our reporting,” explains Don Lecuyer, GWL’s assistant vice-president of corporate properties. “For example, in addition to our head offices, we reported on 10 more properties we own, as well as leased properties in Canada. We are also reporting on the impact of corporate travel. We had this information verified by an independent company before making our submission. It's a fuller picture of our impact and our opportunities to improve our performance, and we've made our submission accessible to the public.”