What the core sustainability disclosure frameworks require from your nature investments

Eight in ten companies

reporting on sustainability are now doing it across more than one framework simultaneously which can be time consuming (or similar). Today, businesses are expected to demonstrate the credibility of their carbon credit purchases, report on biodiversity impacts, assess nature-related risks, and provide evidence to support environmental claims. 

At the same time, sustainability teams are navigating a growing number of reporting frameworks, each with its own requirements, metrics and terminology.

Earthly provides transparent, project-level environmental data that helps businesses meet disclosure requirements across leading sustainability frameworks. Rather than collecting different datasets for different standards, organisations can access one source of information designed to support multiple reporting needs.

Sustainability disclosure frameworks are structured standards that require or guide businesses to report on their environmental, social, and governance impacts in a consistent, verifiable way. They give investors, regulators, customers, and other stakeholders reliable information about how a business is managing its sustainability risks and commitments and to hold companies accountable for the claims they make.

For nature investments specifically, disclosure frameworks matter because they define exactly what data a business needs to hold, what it needs to report, and how that reporting will be scrutinised. 

Buying a carbon credit or a biodiversity credit is only the beginning for climate action. The data behind that investment is what allows you to report with confidence, defend your claims, and demonstrate real impact to the stakeholders who matter.

Jump to:

The

Science Based Targets initiative

(SBTi) Corporate Net-Zero Standard is the world's first science-based framework for corporate net-zero target setting. Version 2.0, published in June 2026, requires companies to set targets, report progress annually, and demonstrate credible action across their value chains.

SBTi's Corporate Net-Zero Standard V2.0

introduces the Ongoing Emissions Responsibility (OER) framework, which brings together beyond value chain mitigation, carbon removals, and neutralisation under one integrated structure. 

Companies with science-based targets must now:

V2.0 requires verified mitigation outcomes, project-level impact data, and annual progress reporting against OER recognition tiers.

The

Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures

(TNFD) provides a global framework for companies and financial institutions to identify, assess, manage, and disclose their dependencies, impacts, risks, and opportunities related to nature.

The TNFD recommendations require companies to disclose their dependencies and impacts on nature through their investments. Specifically:

General statements about nature commitments will not satisfy a TNFD report. You need to report against TNFD's investment-level metrics (A21.0, A23.2, A24.0, A24.3, A24.4) and its full set of impact metrics for core and additional disclosure. If your provider does not structure that data, your team has to build it manually - typically from project PDFs that were never designed with TNFD in mind.

IFRS S2

sets out requirements for companies to disclose climate-related risks, opportunities, and the use of carbon credits. It is being adopted across more than 30 jurisdictions representing over 40% of global market capitalisation. 

For nature investments, S2 focuses specifically on the credibility and integrity of carbon credits - what they are, who certified them, and whether they are genuinely additional and permanent.

IFRS S2 requires companies disclosing carbon credit use to demonstrate the credibility and integrity of those credits:

Vague references to "high-quality credits" will not satisfy an IFRS disclosure. You need a credibility analysis covering the dimensions IFRS considers material; and that documentation needs to exist at the point of purchase, not be assembled months later.

The

European Sustainability Reporting Standards

(ESRS) strengthens the EU's Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD). ESRS E1-7 specifically covers carbon credits used toward climate targets, requiring companies to disclose the volume, standard, biogenic sink classification, and location of credits at the point of purchase. 

It is mandatory for large EU companies and relevant for non-EU companies with EU operations, customers, or investors.

ESRS E1-7 requires companies to disclose the credibility and integrity of carbon credits used toward climate targets. Requirements include:

ESRS does not allow for retrospective data collection. The information has to be there when the investment is made, which means your provider's data infrastructure matters as much as the quality of the projects themselves.

The

Science Based Targets Network

(SBTN)’s Science Based Targets for Nature extends the science-based targets approach beyond carbon to cover freshwater, land, ocean, climate, and biodiversity. It provides guidance for companies to set and disclose nature-related targets, requiring data on biodiversity credit purchases and investment amounts broken down by ecosystem and activity type, structured for attribution to specific SBTN categories.

What SBTN requires from your nature investments

SBTN disclosure requires:

A lump-sum investment across multiple projects with no breakdown by ecosystem or impact type will not satisfy SBTN reporting. The data needs to be categorised from the point of investment, not reconstructed from project documents after the fact.

How Earthly helps you meet it

ISO 14068-1

is the international standard for demonstrating carbon neutrality. It sets requirements for quantifying, reducing, and offsetting greenhouse gas emissions, and specifies what credit identification data companies must hold - including type, vintage, certifying body, and retirement record. 

It also defines Core Principles for carbon credit quality that any portfolio used to support a carbon neutrality claim must meet.

ISO 14068-1 requires:

The

GHG Protocol Corporate Standard

is the most widely used international accounting framework for quantifying and managing greenhouse gas emissions. Its accounting requirements form the foundation on which most other disclosure frameworks above are built. If the data does not hold up against the GHG Protocol, it will not hold up anywhere else.

The GHG Protocol's requirements on nature investments are specific and non-negotiable:

Every nature investment that feeds into your carbon accounts needs to be defensible against all five tests. If your provider cannot give you that data, your carbon accounting has a gap, and so does every disclosure framework built on top of it.

The

Carbon Disclosure Project

(CDP) is one of the world's most widely used environmental disclosure platforms, used by over 23,000 companies globally. It runs an annual questionnaire across three areas: climate change, forests, and water security. 

CDP is primarily focused on value chain management rather than offsets, but nature investments, carbon credits, and biodiversity credits are directly relevant to several key questions in the questionnaire.

CDP's questionnaire includes several questions where nature investments, carbon credits, and biodiversity credits are directly relevant responses. The four most applicable are:

Earthly provides carbon and biodiversity credits directly relevant to CDP questions 3.1.1, 3.5.4, 4.5.1, and 5.10.1. Beyond credits, Earthly can also support the development of nature-based solutions within your value chain, which is relevant to the broader set of CDP questions focused on value chain management and environmental risk response.

Keystone 3.0

is Earthly's proprietary nature project assessment framework - the methodology that sits behind every investment made through Earthly. It evaluates projects across three core pillars: carbon, biodiversity, and people, with water risks and ecosystem health assessed throughout.

Here is what that means for your disclosure:

Earthly's

visualisation tools

turn the verified data that feeds your disclosure into something every stakeholder can engage with.

Together, these tools help you turn complex sustainability data into clear, credible stories that resonate with every stakeholder.

According to

KEY ESG's 2026 ESG statistics guide

, 76% of executives cite data quality as their top ESG reporting challenge, and fewer than 30% of organisations feel confident in the accuracy of their ESG data. With Earthly, every investment comes with transparent, audit-ready data, helping you meet leading sustainability disclosure requirements while communicating your climate and nature impact with confidence.

Browse our

marketplace

to find high-quality carbon and biodiversity projects, or

talk to our team

to find the right solution for your specific reporting requirements.

Why are sustainability disclosures important?

Sustainability disclosures help businesses demonstrate accountability, build trust with investors and customers, comply with evolving regulations and communicate progress towards climate and nature goals. Transparent reporting also helps reduce the risk of

greenwashing

by ensuring environmental claims are backed by credible data.

What is the difference between sustainability reporting and sustainability disclosures?

Sustainability reporting is the broader process of collecting, managing and communicating sustainability information. Sustainability disclosures are the specific information organisations publish to meet the requirements of reporting frameworks, standards or regulations.

What disclosure frameworks apply to nature investments?

The frameworks most commonly relevant to corporate nature investments include SBTi, TNFD, IFRS S2, ESRS E1-7, SBTN, ISO 14068-1, the GHG Protocol, and CDP - though the specific frameworks that apply to your organisation will depend on your sector, jurisdiction, and the nature of your sustainability commitments. 

The EU's Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) is also cited as a major disclosure burden for EU-facing businesses. Most companies with serious sustainability commitments are reporting against more than one framework simultaneously, and each has specific data requirements that your nature investment provider needs to be able to meet.

Can one nature investment satisfy multiple disclosure frameworks at once?

Yes, most sustainability disclosure frameworks require similar information - project integrity, environmental impacts and carbon credit quality. Credits purchased through Earthly come with Keystone 3.0 data designed to meet the requirements of all seven simultaneously, so your team is not maintaining separate data sets for each framework.