The Global Reporting Initiative, or GRI, today released new Climate Change and Energy Standards: GRI 102: Climate Change and GRI 103: Energy.
These updated standards are designed to enhance corporate transparency and accountability regarding climate-related and energy management impacts, providing stakeholders with comprehensive and comparable disclosures.
The release comes as global demand for robust climate information continues to grow, with the standards reflecting years of development and extensive stakeholder engagement to meet the evolving needs of investors, regulators, and civil society.
The new standards emphasize impact management, requiring companies to report not only on climate issues and energy consumption but also on how they are actively managing these impacts.
Notably, GRI 102: Climate Change integrates “Just Transition” principles, mandating reporting on the social impacts of climate action on workers, communities, and vulnerable groups to ensure a fair and inclusive transition to a low-carbon economy. Companies will also be required to disclose comprehensive climate mitigation transition plans, including policies, actions, alignment with scientific evidence, and targets for phasing out fossil fuels.
The standards introduce enhanced disclosures for emissions and energy, covering reduction targets, progress, the use of GHG removals, and carbon credits, while GRI 103: Energy focuses on significant energy-related impacts such as consumption, reduction, efficiency, and renewable energy sourcing.
GRI has also ensured alignment with global frameworks, with a joint statement confirming that equivalent disclosures in IFRS S2 on Scope 1, 2, and 3 GHG emissions can be used to meet corresponding GRI 102 requirements.
The standards align with the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) and the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). The new standards will be effective from January 2027, with pilot programs anticipated before the end of 2025.
Robin Hodess, CEO, GRI, said, “Amid an escalating climate emergency, the GRI Standards for Climate Change and Energy get to the heart of why companies need to be accountable for their impacts on people and planet. By supporting organizations to disclose their climate change impacts in a comprehensive and comparable way, including the impacts of transition and adaptation plans, GRI 102 and 103 have a key role in the advancement of a cohesive and effective global system for climate reporting.”
It must be noted that GRI recently launched the GRI Sustainability Taxonomy, a new digital resource to facilitate machine-readable sustainability disclosures and improve interoperability with other reporting frameworks.
