A group of scientists led by UCD College of Business faculty Andreas Hoepner and Fabiola Schneider; as well as Theodor Cojoianu from University of Edinburgh, Andreas Rasche from Copenhagen Business School and Joeri Rogelj from Imperial College London have published an open letter to the European Commission to seek advancement of the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS), which were adopted by the Commission on 31 July 2023.

We are alarmed by the decision that corporate disclosures on Scope 1, 2 and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have become voluntary disclosures subject to a materiality assessment (see here for Reuters coverage). These indicators, originally proposed as mandatory by the Commission’s own technical advisory body EFRAG, could become ignorable by firms which decide to commission immateriality assessments. While Scope 1, 2 and 3 GHG emissions disclosure were decided to be non-mandatory, a small list of mandatory disclosures remains such as the ‘Integration of sustainability-related performance in managerial incentive schemes’.