Climate Policy Engagement Analysis
Climate Policy Engagement Overview: Vistra Corporation (Vistra) exhibits both positive and negative engagement with science-aligned climate policy. The company engages on US climate policy with a mix of positions, with evidence of advocacy in several states including California, Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Texas. Although the company has expressed positive top-line messaging in the past, it increasingly advocates for fossil fuel infrastructure and power sector deregulation. Vistra is a member of the Business Roundtable, which continues to engage negatively on specific US climate policies.
Top-line Messaging on Climate Policy: Vistra appears to have varied top-lining messaging on climate policy. The company appeared to support government regulation to respond to climate change in its July 2024 sustainability report, but submitted a January 2025 request for power sector deregulation to the Trump administration’s Office of Management and Budget. In its October 2023 climate report, Vistra stated support for the Paris Agreement and net-zero emissions by 2050.
Engagement with Climate-Related Policy: Vistra appears to engage with increasingly negative positions on climate-related policy. At the federal level, the company signed a January 2025 joint letter to incoming Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin requesting the Trump administration to review or repeal existing power sector emissions standards, including those for ozone. A year before, Vistra challenged the Biden administration’s finalized power plant carbon standards in a May 2024 petition for review with the ad hoc coalition Electric Generators for a Sensible Transition, followed by an August 2024 emergency application for immediate stay.
Positioning on Energy Transition: Vistra appears to take mostly negative positions on the energy transition and advocates for a long-term role for fossil fuels. At the federal level, in August 2023 comments with the Power Generators Air Coalition (PGen), the company opposed the ambition of the Biden administration’s original proposal to address carbon emissions from fossil fuel-fired power plants, and suggested that the agency was acting beyond its legal boundary in proposing the use of hydrogen co-firing and carbon capture compliance pathways. Vistra had previously engaged on the pre-proposal for these standards in December 2022, submitting comments with PGen that advocated for the rules to facilitate the construction of new fossil gas plants. The company also pushed for a weak implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act’s hydrogen production tax credit: in May 2023 joint comments to the US Treasury Department, Vistra advocated against the inclusion of any additionality requirement, a mechanism that would ensure that clean hydrogen projects consume energy from new renewable projects only.
Industry Association Governance: Vistra discloses some of its industry association memberships on its corporate website, however it does not include details on each group’s engagement on specific climate policies. The company does not appear to have published a review of its industry association memberships and climate policy engagement. As of 2022, the company no longer appears to be a member of the National Mining Association. Vistra CEO Jim Burke is a member of the Business Roundtable, which demonstrates a range of positions on US climate policy and opposed ambitious Inflation Reduction Act implementation.
A detailed assessment of the company's corporate review on climate policy engagement can be found on InfluenceMap's CA100+ Investor Hub here.
InfluenceMap collects and assesses evidence of corporate climate policy engagement on a weekly basis, depending on the availability of information from each specific data source (for more information see our methodology). While this analysis flows through to the company’s scores each week, the summary above is updated periodically. This summary was last updated in Q3 2025.