At COP27, the Climate Data Steering Committee (CDSC) announced the release of their Recommendations for the Development of the Net-Zero Data Public Utility (NZDPU). The CDSC was formed by Michael Bloomberg and Emanuel Macron in June 2022, and has been moving rapidly to make the NZDPU a reality. It is being assisted by a wide variety of international organisations and vendors.
The idea behind the public utility is to make company and financial institution’s greenhouse gas emissions and related data freely available to whoever needs it, with the intention of improving transparency and accountability. Initially the utility is intended to collect scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions, use of carbon credits, emissions targets and details of any emissions verification. Financed emissions will be included in the scope 3 emissions of financial organizations, but only in a beta form in the initial implementation. A more formal treatment of financed emissions will be included in the second phase of the project.
The Steering Committee conducted an extensive study of the data challenges faced by users of emissions data, as well as the limitations of existing data sources. They concluded that the current data available is insufficient to provide the quality of data required for financed emissions disclosure under PCAF, setting effective financed emissions targets and other uses. The NZDPU is intended to address these data problems, and act as a central repository for standardised, comparable emissions data, as well as emissions reduction targets. This will help financial institutions and other organisations calculate their scope 3 emissions, hold emitters accountable and engage with companies on climate transition.
Significantly, CDP is working with the Steering Committee to provide a base layer of data for the utility. CDP is a non-profit dedicated to improving environmental disclosures. It is probably the largest repository of company reported emissions data, with almost 20,000 disclosing entities. However, current access restrictions to their data make its use impractical for many purposes.
The recommendations document released during COP27 provides a description of what the NZDPU will do, as well as technical details of how the data will be organised. The document forms part of the specification for the utility, and the Steering Committee has put out a request for proposals for a vendor to build the system.
The Steering Committee has also established focus groups to ensure that the needs and experience of users and industry professionals are incorporated into the design and implementation of the system. The goal is to have a pilot version of the system up and running in the second half of 2023.
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