The vocabulary of sustainability reporting
Every standard, regulation and concept the platform reports into — explained plainly, and linked to where it lands in the product.
18 · All topics
- Standards & frameworks
The European Sustainability Reporting Standards
Since January 2024, the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) have defined how companies in the EU disclose sustainability information under the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD). Built by EFRAG and adopted by the European Commission, ESRS brings the rigour and transparency of financial reporting to ESG: creating a consistent, comparable and decision-useful view of impacts, risks and opportunities. At the core sits double materiality, requiring companies to report both their outward impacts and the financial effects of sustainability matters on the business.
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IFRS S1 General Requirements for Disclosure of Sustainability-related Financial Information IFRS S2 Climate-related Disclosures
Launched by the ISSB under the IFRS Foundation, IFRS S1 "General Requirements" and IFRS S2 "Climate-related Disclosures" establish a global baseline for sustainability-related financial disclosures, effective for periods beginning 1 January 2024. Built on the TCFD architecture (Governance, Strategy, Risk Management, Metrics & Targets) and interoperable with SASB-industry metrics, the GHG Protocol and increasingly aligned with GRI/ESRS, S1 & S2 aim to deliver consistent, comparable, insightful information to investors. The standards are designed to be reported alongside financial statements and to improve capital-market trust by reducing greenwashing and disclosure gaps.
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Türkiye Sustainability Reporting Standards (TSRS)
Effective 1 January 2024, Türkiye's Turkey Sustainability Reporting Standards (TSRS) establish the national baseline for sustainability reporting. Issued by the Public Oversight, Accounting and Auditing Standards Authority (KGK) and grounded in the ISSB's IFRS S1 and S2, TSRS requires in-scope companies to disclose decision-useful information on sustainability-related risks, opportunities and climate matters. The standards are designed for interoperability with leading frameworks, enabling consistent, comparable and assurance-ready disclosures and supporting access to sustainable finance.
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Global Reporting Initiative
GRI Standards are the world's most widely used framework for reporting an organization's impacts on the economy, environment, and people. Set by the independent Global Sustainability Standards Board (GSSB), the Standards are modular and continuously updated to reflect global best practice. Any organization—large or small, public or private—can use GRI to report comparable, credible, and stakeholder-relevant information, supported by a clear structure: Universal Standards (GRI 1–3), Sector Standards (industry guidance), and Topic Standards (issue-specific disclosures).
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Integrated Reporting
Integrated Reporting (IR) is a principles-based framework that connects financial statements with sustainability information to explain how an organization creates, preserves, or erodes value over time. Originating from the International Integrated Reporting Framework and now maintained under the IFRS Foundation alongside IASB and ISSB, IR fosters integrated thinking—breaking silos between strategy, governance, risk, and performance—so capital is allocated more productively and transparency rises across the market.
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Green Deal
The European Green Deal is the EU's compass for a clean, resilient, and competitive economy—placing people at the heart of the transition. Launched in 2019, it legally anchors climate-neutrality by 2050 (via the European Climate Law), targets at least −55% emissions by 2030, and steers investment, industry, energy, transport and agriculture toward a net-zero, circular future. The promise: growth powered by innovation, renewables and efficiency—delivered fairly, with support for regions, workers and households.
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Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism
The Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) is the EU's levy-on-imports that prices the carbon embedded in certain carbon-intensive goods at the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) rate. Its aim is simple and systemic: prevent carbon leakage, reward cleaner production globally, and keep the single market fair as EU industry decarbonises.
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EU Emission Trading Systems
The EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) is Europe's flagship cap-and-trade market for greenhouse gases. Active since 2005 and now in Phase IV (2021–2030), it limits total emissions from power and heat generation, energy-intensive industry, aviation—and from 2024, maritime—across the EU (plus EEA and linked systems). The cap shrinks annually; companies must hold one allowance (EUA) per tonne CO₂e they emit, creating a clear, long-term price signal to decarbonise.
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EU Green Taxonomy
The EU Green Taxonomy is the EU's official classification system for what counts as an environmentally sustainable economic activity. It gives companies and investors a common, science-based language to identify, measure, and compare activities that contribute to the EU's climate and environmental objectives—while avoiding greenwashing and channelling capital toward the European Green Deal. The Taxonomy does not mandate where investors must invest. It does, however, require in-scope companies to disclose how much of their business is Taxonomy-eligible and Taxonomy-aligned—making sustainability performance transparent and financially comparable.
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Double Materiality
Double materiality is a whole-of-value-chain exercise. Engage affected and informed stakeholders where impacts occur—upstream producers, logistics partners, contract manufacturers, workers in your own and suppliers' operations, communities, customers, and end-users. Combine dialogue (surveys, interviews, grievance channels) with data (audits, incidents, science-based thresholds) to ground judgements. Refresh the assessment periodically or when triggers occur (new markets, M&A, regulatory shifts, major incidents). The result is a single, decision-useful picture of impacts, risks, and opportunities across the full value chain and over short, medium, and long time horizons.
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Impacts - Risks - Opportunities
Impacts - The result of all your outputs to the outside world, either positive or negative Risks - Anything that interrupts sustainability as a result of geographical location, sector or global-regional trends, whether material from a financial perspective or in terms of impact. Opportunities - Any potential reality that, when realised, results in a favourable outcome, whether financial or impact-focused. These are important concepts in the eyes of yourself and your stakeholders. They provide insight, enable early positioning, increase flexibility, prevent being late, and make you stronger.
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Value Chain
The value chain is an element of the transition period towards stakeholder capitalism and holistic governance. Because we are all on the same planet together. Value is the sum of all contributions made by a product or service from its birth to the end of its life. The value chain is a map of everything touched while all these contributions are being performed. In short, the value chain encompasses all the people, organisations, and natural environments that a product or service comes into direct or indirect contact with throughout its entire life cycle.
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UN Sustainable Development Goals
Adopted by all UN Member States in 2015, the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a universal blueprint to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure prosperity and peace by 2030. The Goals are integrated and interdependent and they call on governments, business, finance, and civil society to act together. For companies, the SDGs provide a shared language to link strategy and operations with real-world outcomes across the economic, social, and environmental dimensions of development.
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NET ZERO
Net zero is the scientifically anchored end-state where the greenhouse gases we emit are balanced by those we permanently remove, so planetary warming stops rising. In practice, that means deep, front-loaded cuts across your operations and value chain, with only a small, hard-to-abate residue neutralized through high-integrity removals. The destination is global; the journey is firm-specific—grounded in your footprint, strategy, and governance.
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The Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions
Greenhouse gases are a class of gases that alter the planet's energy balance by trapping heat in the atmosphere; emissions are the release of these gases into the atmosphere as a result of specific activities. Greenhouse gases trap heat in the atmosphere and drive climate change. The main gases reported by companies are carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄), nitrous oxide (N₂O) and fluorinated gases (e.g. HFCs, PFCs, SF₆, NF₃). As each gas has a different warming effect (radiative forcing) and lifetime in the atmosphere, Global Warming Potential (GWP) factors are used to aggregate and compare their effects; thus, all emissions are converted into carbon dioxide equivalents (CO₂e).
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Environment, Social and Governance
Planet, Human and Harmonisation - The behind-the-scenes drivers of Environmental, Social and Governance.
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Targets
A reality to be achieved in the future world, the ultimate goal. All goals are to some extent centred around the Sustainable Development Goals; all goals are aimed at achieving ‘good’ for humanity and our planet. The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals provide a structure for addressing some of our most serious challenges. Changing the way we work, produce and consume is of vital importance. Climate change, human working conditions, occupational injuries, the share of sustainable products in revenue, etc., targets can be set for each theme group. This depends entirely on your sector, your country's national contributions, SDG commitments, and the market.
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Science Based Target Initiative
Science-based targets turn climate ambition into an operational plan. The Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) gives companies and financial institutions a clear, credible way to set GHG reduction goals that align with the latest climate science and a 1.5°C pathway—so you know how much and how fast to decarbonize across your business and value chain. With common rules, sector pathways, and third-party validation, SBTi replaces guesswork with rigor, helping leaders move from pledges to performance.
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See it on your own data
A short walkthrough with someone who knows the standards — no slide deck.