Carbon reporting and data

A CFO once asked me something simple: “Why is carbon data still so hard to trust?”

And honestly, it is a fair question. In finance, if numbers are wrong, markets react instantly.

In climate? Wrong data can sit inside reports for months. Sometimes years.

Most people imagine emissions data is precise.

But behind the scenes?

• There are supplier assumptions.
• Manual spreadsheets.
• Missing numbers, activity data.
• Estimates factors carried forward because no one had better data or that’s what we used last year.

Then everyone acts surprised when targets feel impossible.

Yet companies are expected to make serious decisions from this:

• Targets.
• Investments.
• Compliance.
• Public commitments. And what not.

We talk a lot about reducing emissions.

The reality check:

Most sustainability teams are not struggling because they lack ambition. They’re struggling because confidence in the underlying data is still fragile.

Before we talk net-zero —

We should ask:

• How certain are we about where we stand today?

But maybe the harder question is:

• How sure are we about the number we are trying to reduce in the first place?

Because if the foundation is weak, everything built on top becomes harder.