Introduction

The Corporate Emissions Reduction Transparency (CERT) report is a voluntary initiative for eligible companies to present a snapshot of progress on their emissions reduction and renewable electricity commitments.

This reader’s guide will help readers understand and interpret the range of commitment and reporting options used in the CERT report 2023. Definitions of key terms can be found in the CERT report 2023 glossary.

Overview

Each participating company’s CERT report shows:

  • Accounting approach – outlines the reporting period, scope 2 method and reporting boundary the company uses to report their information and data.
  • Commitment cards – show snapshots of voluntary emissions reduction and/or renewable electricity commitments made by the company and the progress made for those commitments.
  • Net emissions and renewable electricity – shows the company’s total scope 1 and scope 2 emissions, and renewable electricity percentage for the reporting year for activities occurring in Australia.
  • Surrendered units and certificates details, where provided.
  • Supporting information.

The data workbook contains additional information regarding each company’s commitments, including the calculations we use to assess the Clean Energy Regulator (CER) data verified commitments.

Updates for 2023

Based on feedback from participating companies, public consultation submissions and other stakeholders, the following updates were made for the CERT report 2023:

  • Reporting all eligible climate related commitments is required by participating companies – this includes commitments relating to their greenhouse gas emissions and/or renewable electricity use.
  • Recognising independently assured commitments as a third commitment category, allowing companies to show progress on their commitments where this cannot be verified using CER data.
  • Adding a jurisdictional power percentage to recognise Large-scale generation certificate (LGC) surrenders made by a jurisdiction with a renewable electricity target (for example, the ACT Government’s Renewable Energy Target) as renewable electricity consumption for activities occurring in that jurisdiction.
  • Streamlining reporting through the development of an alternative methodology for calendar year and equity reporting. Participating companies may report independently assured data directly to the CER, rather than providing adjustment multipliers for National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting (NGER) data.
  • Revising base period emissions for companies that have undergone a significant structural change (such as a merger, acquisition, or divestment). Companies should revise their base period emissions to allow meaningful comparison of their progress over time.
  • Providing additional commitment information so companies can categorise and specify where commitments apply to scope 3 or corporate global emissions that are not CER data verified. Companies can also provide links to other frameworks the commitment is reported under.

Accounting approach

Companies that participate in the CERT report must adhere to the guidelines. These guidelines specify the information companies can provide for inclusion in their CERT report. However, there is some flexibility to allow companies to align their CERT report with their publicly disclosed commitments. In particular, the design of the CERT report aims to accommodate the complexity of joint venture arrangements and international corporate structures. The reporting choices made by companies affect how we calculate progress on their CER data verified commitments, and how their net emissions position and renewable electricity percentage is presented.

Companies can choose an accounting approach in their CERT report for the:

  • Reporting period – can be either financial year (the default to align with the NGER reporting period) or calendar year.
  • Scope 2 method – scope 2 emissions can be either calculated on a location or market basis.
  • Reporting boundary – can be either operational control (the default, aligning with how NGER data is calculated) or equity share (where a company shares working interest in facilities).

Details of scope 2 accounting calculations can be found in the CERT report guidelines and supporting examples. Some calculation terms that are based on calendar year (for example, the Renewable Power Percentage) are adjusted as needed based on the company’s choice of reporting period.

When reporting on a calendar year or equity share basis, companies can choose to either:

  • provide multipliers to adjust their NGER-reported emissions and electricity data.
  • provide emissions and electricity data that has been independently assured for their net emissions and renewable electricity calculations.

More details, if applicable, are provided in the ‘Notes’ field of a company’s CERT report.

Commitment cards

Each commitment card represents an emissions reduction or renewable electricity commitment. Companies can have multiple commitments, as well as commitments for their subsidiaries.

Broadly, there are three types of commitments that can be included in a company’s CERT report:

  1. CER data verified commitments
  2. Independently assured commitments
  3. Company assured commitments.

Within each commitment card, the commitment and context statements are provided by the company. The commitment statement summarises the commitment in the company’s own words. The context statement is an opportunity to provide additional, qualitative information relevant to the commitment to help readers understand the company’s operating environment. Additional details about the commitment are also presented, where provided by the company, including emissions coverage (scope 1, 2 or 3), whether the commitment applies to global efforts, and other frameworks the commitment is reported under.

CER data verified commitments

CER data verified commitments are commitments where the CER has sufficient data to calculate and verify progress.

These commitment cards are labelled CER data verified. The CER uses its data holdings, data-matching and other internal processes to calculate and verify a company’s progress on its commitments. The progress percentage value represents the percentage of the commitment goal achieved to date, along with an absolute progress figure (for example, in tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2-e)).

Following each progress percentage value is a short description of the information used to calculate progress, such as:

  • goal (for example, 75% reduction)
  • net, gross, or combined emissions reduction commitment
  • baseline year (if applicable).

Independently assured commitments

Independently assured commitments have received limited or reasonable assurance from an independent and suitably qualified assurance provider (in accordance with relevant standards and accounting methods) for data provided by the company and used in the calculation of progress on the commitment. The underlying progress data is not verified by the CER. The CER calculates the progress percentage according to the CERT report calculation methodology outlined in the guidelines. The progress percentage value represents the percentage of the commitment goal achieved to date, along with an absolute progress figure (using the relevant metric).

Companies choosing this option may have commitments that cannot be verified using data held by the CER yet wish to recognise that their progress data has been independently assured by a third-party. Such commitments may include those related to scope 3 emissions, emissions intensity of products, and international emissions reductions. The progress data for these commitments must have received limited or reasonable assurance from an independent assurance provider in accordance with relevant standards and accounting methods.

For more information on the difference between assurance levels, visit Levels of assurance explained.
 

Along with the level of assurance provided, other details about the assurance engagement are presented under the progress details, including:

  • Assurance provider: the company that provided the assurance statement or report.
  • Assurance standard(s) applied: the Australian or international assurance standard, that is ASAE 3000 or ASAE 3410 for Australian information, or ISAE 3000, ISAE 3410 or ISO 14064-3 for international information.
  • Accounting method(s) used: The emissions reporting or accounting standard(s) or method(s) used when calculating the independently assured progress metric.

Company assured commitments

Company assured commitments apply where progress cannot be calculated using data held by the CER and an independent assurance statement has not been provided. Such commitments may include those related to scope 3 emissions, the emissions intensity of products, and international emissions reductions.

The CERT report guidelines allow companies to choose how to frame these commitment statements. Companies are responsible for providing their own updates regarding progress on commitments. Updates can be qualitative or quantitative information and are not verified by the CER.

Net emissions and renewable electricity

This section of a company’s CERT report shows its gross and net emissions, electricity use, renewable electricity percentage and Large-scale generation certificate (LGC) surrenders for the chosen reporting period for activities occurring in Australia. The values in the table are calculated by the CER, with the underlying data collected and verified by the CER or provided by the participating company with independent assurance.

The total net emissions are shown as a sum of scope 1 and scope 2 net emissions for the company.

Participating companies are required to report their scope 2 emissions under both location- and market-based accounting approaches. Dual reporting is in accordance with international best practice emissions accounting outlined in the Greenhouse Gas Protocol Scope 2 guidance and the Australian Government’s Climate Active initiative. For the CERT report 2023, companies can choose whether to display their market-based data in their CERT report.

The emissions data for companies reporting on a calendar year or equity share basis may vary from their NGER-reported data. In this case, the quantities are based on either multiplier-adjusted NGER data and presented as CER data verified, or on separately provided independently assured data with assurance details included.

Applying multipliers to NGER-reported data

Companies that report equity share data using the multiplier method must supply equity share percentages for each NGER facility they have an ownership share of, such as a joint venture (including those outside of their operational control). Emissions and electricity values are adjusted accordingly.

Companies that report calendar year data using the multiplier method must supply multipliers to reflect how their data has varied from their NGER-reported financial year data to the most recent calendar year. Their historic calendar year data is estimated as the average of the two overlapping NGER reporting years.

Using independently assured data

Companies reporting equity share or calendar year data using the independent assurance method must provide an assurance statement from an independent and suitably qualified assurance practitioner for all metrics used in the calculation of net emissions and renewable electricity use. We calculate net emissions and renewable electricity use based on the independently assured quantities according to the CERT report calculation methodology described in the CERT report guidelines. Details of the assurance engagement are shown in the notes section below the net emissions and renewable electricity data.

Notes

The notes provide additional information to assist readers in interpreting the net emissions and renewable electricity data. Notes in this section also outline how company data presented in the CERT report may differ from company data published elsewhere. For example, where a company has chosen calendar year reporting for their CERT report, a note is provided in this section to inform readers that the company’s CERT report may not align with their NGER-published data, as the NGER scheme operates on a financial year basis.

Surrendered units chart

Some company CERT reports show the proportion and number of units cancelled, retired, or surrendered by the company for the reporting year. Units may not necessarily be surrendered against specific commitments. Units may have been surrendered by a third party on behalf of the company (for example, Australian carbon credit units (ACCUs) procured from third party carbon offset providers). Where no units have been surrendered by the company in relation to their CERT report ‘no units surrendered’ will be displayed.

Units surrendered by companies in relation to scope 3 emissions are not included in the chart but may be noted in the commitment or company context statements.

Supporting information

Context

The supporting information section in a company’s CERT report shows the broader context relevant to the participating company’s net emissions position, emissions reduction or sustainability efforts that may not relate directly to their commitments. This information is provided by the company.

Resources

The resources section in a company’s CERT report provides links to the CERT report data workbook, CERT report guidelines, the CERT report 2023 glossary and the highlights of the latest NGER report.