Global Energy Companies Leading New CSR Reporting Trends

As a result of increasing public interest in CSR reporting in the boardroom—a trend that primarily is being driven by a vocal minority —many 2007 CSR reports are showing a trend toward more data-intensive reporting and less emphasis on “soft” information, such as community activities. While they used to be about cleaning beaches and adopting schools, these reports now provide information such as percentage reductions in GHG emissions.

Interest in environmental “accounting” seems more evident, as evidenced by the detailed and data-focused 2007 CSR reports of such industry leaders as ExxonMobil, Chevron and BP. More demand from institutional shareholders such as Goldman Sachs for good benchmarking information is encouraging this trend and companies are starting to back up their claims with non-financial accounting systems like the kind we sell that can be third-party assessed against standards such as the GRI G3.

Non-financial accounting systems enable a company operating Facility A and Facility B to generate data that are consistently calculated, so that when it is rolled up by division and geographic region, you can count on the numbers at each level of the organization. That’s not so certain with companies that have not yet implemented an integrated, enterprise-level solution. Many companies still record their environmental reporting on spreadsheets, like they used to do their financial accounting more than 20 years ago. Would that be acceptable for financial data today? We see a continued trend as organizations migrate to more accounting-style platforms, including auditable work processes and links to other enterprise systems, to bring non-financial reporting up-to-par with financial systems.

3 comments June 3rd, 2008