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The Corporate Climate Finance Playbook, developed by the Climate Policy Initiative and Salesforce, argues that meeting global climate targets requires corporations to move beyond piecemeal efforts toward an integrated climate finance strategy. The document categorizes financial tools into capital deployment, capital management, and capital raising, providing a decision-making flowchart to match instruments to the innovation stage of a project and the company's risk appetite. It highlights best practices from companies like Autodesk, Microsoft, and Cisco Foundation, emphasizing the use of blended finance to de-risk early-stage technologies and scale existing solutions.

Eighteen civil society organizations are calling on Crédit Agricole CIB to cease its role as a financial advisor for the Papua LNG project, led by TotalEnergies, ExxonMobil, Santos, and JX Nippon. The letter argues that the project, which includes 9 offshore wells and a 320km pipeline, would increase Papua New Guinea's energy and industry emissions by over 7% and generate 220 million tons of CO2 equivalent in scope 3 emissions. The authors highlight risks to frontline communities in Gulf Province, potential stranded assets due to a projected 72% decline in global gas demand by 2050, and a lack of guaranteed sales agreements. The organizations demand that Crédit Agricole withdraw from the project, end financial services for new gas fields and LNG terminals, and condition services to TotalEnergies on a commitment to stop new upstream and midstream oil and gas projects.

Reclaim Finance criticizes the Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance (AOA) for failing to align its Target Setting Protocol Version 4 (TSPV4) with UN High-Level Expert Group (HLEG) recommendations. The organization argues that the AOA allows members to use relative intensity metrics that can disguise absolute emission increases and fails to mandate Scope 3 targets for high-emitting sectors like oil and gas. Reclaim Finance calls for mandatory absolute targets, robust transition plans for asset owners, and a strict prohibition on investing in companies expanding coal, oil, and gas infrastructure. Additionally, it urges the AOA to define concrete escalation procedures for investor engagement and to adopt the updated September 2023 IEA Net Zero Roadmap.

Reclaim Finance analyzed 150 financial institutions and found that very few have adopted steel decarbonization targets, and those that have are characterized by significant flaws. Only 16 of 60 assessed banks have steel targets, most of which rely on intensity metrics rather than absolute emissions and exclude underwriting activities and Scope 3 emissions. The report argues that current targets are insufficient to prevent investment in high-carbon infrastructure, such as new blast furnaces and metallurgical coal mines.

The report evaluates the CCIA for the Tetra4 Cluster 2 gas field expansion, which includes up to 400 test wells and 300 production wells. The author argues that the CCIA fails to meet South African legal requirements for a full life-cycle emissions assessment, specifically citing the omission of Scope 3 emissions from the final impact determination and several errors in Scope 1 calculations. Key technical failures identified include the use of outdated global warming potential (GWP) values, unrealistic flaring efficiency assumptions, and the omission of methane emissions from well drilling and operational gas production. Additionally, the report finds that the CCIA provides an unsupported claim that the project's LNG will replace more GHG-emitting fuels, while failing to account for the transport of 40% of the produced LNG.

The document analyzes border carbon adjustments (BCA) as tools to prevent carbon leakage and support domestic carbon pricing. It details a 'decision tree' of design options, including trade flow coverage, geographic exemptions, emission scopes (Scope 1, 2, and 3), and methods for calculating embedded emissions. The brief highlights the tension between environmental objectives and industrial protectionism, noting that fragmented national BCA regimes could create a 'spaghetti bowl' of conflicting requirements that increase administrative burdens for exporters and strain international trade and climate cooperation.

The Corporate Commitments and Emissions Explorer uses a formula-based approach to estimate corporate emissions trajectories, incorporating revenue growth, climate targets, and sectoral intensities. It offers five preset outlooks—Current, Climate-Aligned Action, Herd Catches Leaders, Laggards Catch Herd, and No Further Action—to simulate different levels of corporate ambition. The tool focuses on Scope 1 and 2 emissions, utilizing data from CDP and the Net Zero Tracker, while excluding Scope 3 emissions due to data quality and double-counting risks. Companies are categorized as ambitious, somewhat ambitious, or least ambitious based on their disclosure habits, emission intensities, and the nature of their climate commitments.

The document is a formal letter from several NGOs to the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) arguing that current SBTi guidelines are insufficient to meet the standards set by the UN High Level Expert Group's 'Integrity Matters' report. The authors identify gaps in environmental integrity, accountability, and credibility, specifically calling for a strict 1.5°C baseline, full Scope 3 emissions disclosure, and the phase-out of fossil fuels. They demand that SBTi increase transparency regarding company submissions and remove entities that fail to meet their commitments, citing JBS as an example of misleading claims.

Climate finance for agrifood systems is critically low, representing only 4.3% of total project-level climate finance in 2019/20. The report highlights a massive investment gap, noting that current flows must increase at least sevenfold to meet conservative transition needs. While agriculture and forestry dominate project-level funding, essential mitigation areas like food loss and low-carbon diets are severely underfunded. The analysis reveals a heavy reliance on public funding (85%) and significant geographic disparities, with East Asia and the Pacific receiving the most finance, while South Asia and Latin America remain underserved relative to their emissions and vulnerability. The report advocates for repurposing harmful agricultural subsidies and leveraging private capital to scale climate-resilient and low-carbon food systems.

Reclaim Finance criticizes the second phase of Climate Action 100+ (CA100+), stating that the coalition failed in its first phase to secure comprehensive net-zero targets or align corporate capital expenditure with 1.5°C goals. While welcoming new transparency requirements for lead investors, Reclaim Finance argues that the benchmark remains too focused on transparency rather than implementation and lacks systematic sanctions or exclusion mechanisms for non-compliant members and companies.

The statement criticizes a Ceres paper titled "Key Elements for a Net Zero Transition at Oil and Gas Exploration and Production Companies," claiming it fails to require absolute emission reductions or alignment with 1.5°C pathways. The authors argue that because Ceres advises the Glasgow Financial Alliance on Net Zero (GFANZ), this weak framework could erode established norms for net-zero finance by favoring the interests of the oil and gas industry, specifically citing the involvement of companies like ConocoPhillips and Pioneer Natural Resources in the paper's development.

Reclaim Finance analyzes the Ceres document "Key Elements for a Net Zero Transition at Oil and Gas Exploration and Production Companies," concluding that it favors "business as usual" for the fossil fuel industry. The analysis identifies seven key weaknesses, including the failure to require Scope 3 targets, the reliance on intensity-based rather than absolute emission targets, and a lack of restrictions on carbon offsets. Reclaim Finance asserts that the Ceres framework is influenced by industry players like ConocoPhillips and fails to meet the standards set by GFANZ, the IPCC, and the IEA, which necessitate absolute production cuts to maintain a 1.5°C pathway.

The Net Zero Stocktake 2023 finds that while the number of entities with net zero targets has grown to 1,475, a significant portion of sub-national governments and large companies still lack any emission reduction targets. While national targets are increasingly underpinned by legislation, there is limited improvement in the robustness of corporate and sub-national strategies, particularly regarding Scope 3 emissions and the use of offsets. Notably, no major fossil fuel producers have committed to phasing out fossil fuels despite having net zero pledges.

The Climate Bonds Initiative (CBI) establishes a screening process for sustainability-linked bonds (SLBs) to ensure they drive genuine decarbonisation. Inclusion requires eligible debt instruments to be self-labelled as SLBs and provide public disclosure of sustainability performance targets (SPTs). CBI assesses these targets against 1.5°C-aligned sectoral pathways from CBI, the Transition Pathway Initiative (TPI), the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi), and CRREM. Bonds are categorized as 'Fully-aligned', 'Strongly-aligned', 'Aligning', or 'not-aligned' based on their adherence to these pathways and the presence of comprehensive transition plans. The methodology specifically mandates scope 3 emission targets for companies selling fossil fuel products and airports.

The guide describes 'book and claim' as a flexible chain of custody model where producers 'book' emissions savings from clean fuels or materials in one location, and customers 'claim' those benefits for climate disclosures elsewhere via certificates. This system is designed to channel finance into nascent decarbonization technologies, such as sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), by allowing corporations to cover the price premium of cleaner alternatives when physical offtake is impractical. To ensure accountability, the system relies on independent verification of the physical supply chain, the use of registries to prevent double counting, and adherence to standardized reporting guidelines.

Reclaim Finance evaluates the revised Climate Action 100+ benchmark, noting that while it now incorporates IEA Net Zero Emissions by 2050 scenarios and requires disclosure of capital expenditures on carbon-intensive assets, it remains flawed. Key limitations include an over-reliance on disclosure over alignment, a lack of prioritization among indicators, and insufficient requirements for absolute emission reductions and scope 3 emissions in certain sectors.

The document outlines an eight-step process for finance leaders to align GHG emissions reporting with financial accounting. It emphasizes the need for cross-functional collaboration between finance and sustainability teams, the application of risk and materiality assessments, and the extension of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems and internal controls to ensure GHG data is reliable, verifiable, and decision-useful for capital markets.

The document outlines the application of the GHG Protocol's three scopes of emissions—direct (Scope 1), indirect energy (Scope 2), and value chain (Scope 3)—within a corporate accounting context. It emphasizes using financial reporting boundaries and existing ERP systems to automate data collection from invoices, thereby improving data quality and auditability. The guide details three methods for Scope 3 upstream emissions: spend-based, activity-based, and supplier-specific, while noting the challenges of downstream calculations. It also introduces the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) standards IFRS S1 and S2, which require climate-related disclosures and GHG emissions reporting to be aligned with financial statements.

Reclaim Finance criticizes TotalEnergies for denying responsibility for scope 3 emissions and opposing a shareholder resolution to set reduction targets for these emissions. The organization argues that TotalEnergies influences fossil fuel demand through lobbying and investment and maintains a "climaticide" strategy by planning hydrocarbon production for 2030 that is 81% higher than the level required for a 1.5°C scenario. Reclaim Finance highlights that international standards, such as the SBTi and CSRD, increasingly require scope 3 reporting and targets, and notes that TotalEnergies plans to allocate at least 67% of its 2030 capital expenditures to fossil fuels.

Reclaim Finance advises investors to integrate climate criteria into their 2023 Annual General Meeting (AGM) votes. The briefing argues that 'Say on Climate' resolutions are often used for greenwashing and should be opposed if strategies are incomplete or misaligned with a 1.5°C scenario. It specifically calls for opposition to TotalEnergies' Say on Climate and support for shareholder resolutions at ENGIE and energy majors (TotalEnergies, BP, Shell, Chevron, and ExxonMobil) regarding Paris Agreement alignment. Additionally, it recommends using routine votes on director reappointment, executive remuneration, and financial statements to sanction a lack of climate ambition or risk disclosure.