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CDP Climate Change 2022 Reporting Guidance

Preparing your CDP response

Please find below information on the support materials and options available to companies, and important notes for completing your disclosure. Please review these notes carefully as you prepare your response, even if you have responded to the questionnaire in previous years.

CDP disclosure support materials

CDP provides a variety of support materials to help organizations disclosing to our questionnaires. Before completing the corporate questionnaires, we strongly recommend you read this Reporting Guidance, the Scoring introduction, and relevant Scoring Methodology. Please also refer to the CDP Technical Notes and other guidance materials accessible from the guidance tool after signing in to the website, and see the Frequently Asked Questions on the website.

Reporting guidance

The reporting guidance in this document includes the following:

  • Module-level guidance: for select modules this guidance provides an overview, key changes, sector-specific content for the module, and important disclosure notes. This section also presents question pathway diagrams showing the flow of questions through each module.
  • Question-level guidance: at the question level, guidance is separated into the following components to provide clarity around questions, terminology and requirements.

- Rationale: provides reasoning behind the inclusion of each question;
- Connections to other frameworks: notes for each relevant question in the climate change questionnaire, connections to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), RobecoSAM Corporate Sustainability Assessment (DJSI), the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), RE100, and for financial services institutions only, the Net Zero Asset Managers (NZAM) initiative and CEO Water Mandate;
- Requested content: offers context around each question and requested criteria;
- Explanation of terms: provides detailed definitions for specific terminology;
- Example responses: for select questions, this provides an example of a response that would include all information requested; and
- Additional information: for select questions, this provides optional contextual information and sources related to the subject of the disclosure request.

  • Glossary: viewable at the end of the reporting guidance, the glossary contains a subset of 'Explanation of terms'.
  • Appendix: Agricultural/Forestry management practices.

If you have any questions that are not answered in the reporting guidance, the additional guidance noted below, or our Frequently Asked Questions, please contact your local CDP contact.

Webinars and workshops

CDP hosts live webinars and workshops designed to aid you with environmental reporting.

Please visit the workshops and webinars and climate change pages of CDP's website for more details.

CDP Reporter Services

CDP Reporter Services program offers tailored support, enhanced data access and thought leadership on managing and reporting environmental risk to your business. Access the tools you need to move from disclosure to leadership on integrating climate, forests management, and water security into your wider business strategy. For year-round, personalized disclosure support from a dedicated CDP account manager, a gap analysis of your previous response, final review before submission and analytics tools to benchmark yourself against peers and understand best practice contact [email protected]. Visit the Reporter Services page of CDP's website for more information.

CDP's Accredited Solutions Providers

CDP partners with leading environmental service providers that can support companies throughout all stages of the measurement, reporting and management of their climate and sustainability data and impacts. All CDP solutions providers have met specific accreditation criteria. See provider areas of expertise below, and visit the accredited solutions provider directory to search for the provider best able to support you:

  • Carbon reduction solutions providers offer technology and services that can help your organization reduce carbon emissions and improve energy efficiency.
  • Climate change consultancy solutions providers have a wide range of technical expertise to support companies with establishing and implementing climate change and sustainability strategies.
  • Science-based target (SBT) solutions providers have expertise in helping companies to set and implement targets in line with what the latest climate science says is necessary.
  • Education & training solutions providers improve employee awareness and understanding of how climate change affects their organization through carbon management training programs.
  • Renewable energy solutions providers provide expertise in procuring, tracking, and generating renewable power.
  • Software solutions providers simplify the collection, monitoring, and reporting of sustainability, CSR, and environmental data through integrated sustainability software applications.
  • Verification solutions providers help organizations disclose accurate data and improve internal processes by providing third-party verification and assurance of emissions data, a practice recommended by CDP.

As well as visiting our accredited solutions provider webpage, you can also contact [email protected] to find out more.

Important notes for completing your disclosure

Acronyms

Avoid using bespoke internal acronyms unless required for your organization’s response, in which case please provide their meaning to enable correct analysis and scoring.

Blank responses

Leaving a response blank is interpreted as non-disclosure. For numeric fields, values of zero (0) imply a measurement has been made, and the value is zero (0). For numeric fields where no measurement has been made, please leave the field blank and provide an explanation in an open text field for that same question (e.g. 'Comment' (optional) or 'Please explain' (scored)). If there is no open text field for the question, you may provide an explanation in the Further information field in the ORS at the end of your disclosure. Leaving a response blank and entering a value of zero (0) have different scoring implications. Please see the scoring methodology for more details.

Character limits

The character limits noted in the reporting guidance and in the ORS include spaces.

'Comment' columns

Some questions include a column labelled as 'Comment'. Note that providing information in these columns is optional.

Company-specific information

Some questions request company-specific information, rationales, case studies and/or examples. This level of detail gives data users confidence that the issue at hand has been thoroughly considered in the context of the responding organization's own business and not simply assessed in general terms.

  • Be sure to include company-specific detail, such as references to activities, programs, products, services, methodologies, or operating locations unique to your company’s business or operations. A company-specific explanation should include details that make the answer true for the responding company and are distinct from other companies in the same industry and/or geography.
  • Clear rationales are those which provide logical reasoning for methodologies, descriptions, decision, and actions.
  • Case studies are defined as a detailed description of the implementation of a process, strategy or decision to a specific situation and/or task. When formulating case studies, responders may find it helpful to consider a “Situation-Task-Action-Result” (STAR) approach :1) Situation: what was the context or background? 2) Task: what needed to be done or what was the problem to be solved? 3) Action: what was the course of action taken? 4) Result: what was the final outcome of the course of action?
  • An example does not need to follow the STAR approach. It can be shorter than a case study but should include some company-specific detail.

For more details, refer to the Scoring Introduction on the CDP website.

Consistency

CDP encourages a comprehensive and consistent response. Please ensure there is no conflicting information in your responses, both within a question and across the questionnaire.

Copy forward

The 'copy forward' functionality will be available in the ORS for companies that disclosed to CDP in previous reporting years. This functionality auto-populates your most recent answers into your questionnaire where applicable.

Note that this functionality may have been disabled for modified data points. The reporting guidance will indicate which questions have been modified. The Questionnaire Changes document on the guidance section of the CDP website lists all revisions from the previous year.

Please review the auto-populated answers carefully. It is your responsibility to ensure your answers are updated for the accuracy and completeness of your response.

Data accuracy

CDP recognizes that there may be uncertainty linked to data – this can arise from data gaps, assumptions, metering/measurement constraints including equipment accuracy etc. CDP allows estimated data to be submitted. However, an emphasis is placed on reporting transparently and this means that a company should always provide an explanation when its reported data is not accurate and detail the uncertainty (use the 'Please explain' or 'Comment' columns provided in the question).

Drop-down options ('Other, please specify')

Please select from the options provided whenever possible, and only select 'Other, please specify' when none of the listed options is appropriate. This greatly assists data analysis. If selecting 'Other, please specify', you must add a label that describes the option you are providing data for.

'Further information' field

At the end of the questionnaire, there is an opportunity to provide additional information or context that you feel is relevant to your organization’s response. This field is optional and not scored.

Mergers and acquisitions (M&As)

All disclosure should be defined by the organizational boundary applicable at the time of the stated reporting period. (Note that for CDP disclosure, organizations are encouraged to align their reporting period and organizational boundaries with their financial reporting).
Regarding forward-looking disclosure, organizations should include information that was correct at the time of the stated reporting period (for example, for data points referring to the future or "the next two years"). Organizations undergoing (or that have undergone) M&As need to consider the timing of the M&As and reporting period as follows:

  • Organizations that were acquired after the end of the current reporting period: these should respond with what was planned (strategy, targets, etc.) before being acquired (i.e., during the reporting period). For transparency, where possible they may state where they consider that the forward-looking information may be subject to change due to the very recent acquisition.
  • Organizations that were acquired during the reporting period: these should provide information that was applicable and correct to the best of their knowledge at the end of the reporting period. At the time of submitting their response to CDP, this information may not be the most up to date due to changes underway following the acquisition. For transparency, the company may state this in their disclosure where possible.

Personal data

It is important that you do not include the name of any individual or any other personal data in your response. For questions that ask for the positions of staff, out of respect for personal data privacy we are asking only for the position and not for the individual’s name or any other information relating to them.

Providing feedback to CDP

You can provide feedback to CDP on the content of our questionnaires and supporting documents through our online technical feedback form.

We are unable to respond individually to all feedback, but please be assured that all form submissions are reviewed and contribute towards our continuous improvement.

However, if you represent a responding organization and would like to request a response, please get in touch with your local CDP contact.