Businesses pledge to help meet Obama's climate goals

Officials with 13 major companies join Obama administration officials at the White House on Monday to launch what they call the "American Business Act on Climate Pledge."

"Each company is announcing significant new pledges to reduce their emissions, increase low-carbon investments, deploy more clean energy, and take other actions to build more sustainable businesses and tackle climate change," the White House said in a statement.

The 13 companies: Alcoa, Apple, Bank of America, Berkshire Hathaway Energy, Cargill, Coca-Cola, General Motors, Goldman Sachs, Google, Microsoft, PepsiCo, UPS, and Walmart.

The administration hopes these commitments give it momentum as officials head to Paris later this year for talks on a global climate change agreement.

Company leaders will meet at the White House Monday with Secretary of State John Kerry and other administration officials.

Obama's climate change plan "will cut nearly 6 billion tons of carbon pollution through 2030, an amount equivalent to taking all the cars in the United States off the road for more than four years," the White House said.

The announcement comes while Obama himself is in Africa.