About Us

WHO WE ARE

The SBTi is a partnership between CDP, the United Nations Global Compact, World Resources Institute (WRI) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). The SBTi call to action is one of the We Mean Business Coalition commitments.

Learn more:

• Meet the team
• Our partners
• Organizational governance
• Technical governance
• How we are funded
• Meet the Technical Council
• Meet the Technical Advisory Group (TAG)
• Meet the Scientific Advisory Group (SAG)
• The Science Based Targets Network (SBTN)
• Join our team
• Subscribe to our newsletter
• Requests for proposals

WHAT WE DO

We must urgently increase ambition in the fight against climate change.

The latest climate science sends a clear warning that we must dramatically curb temperature rise to avoid the catastrophic impacts of climate change.

Science-based targets show companies and financial institutions how much and how quickly they need to reduce their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to prevent the worst effects of climate change.

The Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi):

• Defines and promotes best practice in emissions reductions and net-zero targets in line with climate science.
• Provides technical assistance and expert resources to companies who set science-based targets in line with the latest climate science.
• Brings together a team of experts to provide companies with independent assessment and validation of targets.
• The SBTi was the lead partner of the Business Ambition for 1.5°C campaign - an urgent call to action from a global coalition of UN agencies, business and industry leaders, which mobilized companies to set net-zero science-based targets in line with a 1.5°C future.

The change has already begun and action is gaining pace. Over 2,000 organizations worldwide are leading the transition to a net-zero economy by setting emissions reduction targets grounded in climate science through the SBTi.

Our challenge

The race is on to limit global warming to 1.5°C and prevent the worst effects of climate change.

Through the 2015 Paris Agreement, world governments committed to limiting global temperature rise to well-below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit warming to 1.5°C. In 2018, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that global warming must not exceed 1.5°C above pre-industrial temperatures to avoid the catastrophic impacts of climate change. To achieve this, GHG emissions must halve by 2030 – and drop to net zero by 2050.

Business has a vital role to play in driving down greenhouse gas emissions and building the resilient, zero-emissions economy we urgently need. This action must be grounded in science.

We need a race to the top, led by pioneering companies. This will empower peers, suppliers and customers to follow suit and drive governments to take bolder action.

Our aims

The SBTi mobilizes the private sector to take the lead on urgent climate action.

Science-based targets show companies and financial institutions how much and how quickly they must decarbonize to prevent the worst impacts of climate change.

By guiding companies in science-based target setting, we enable them to tackle global warming while seizing the benefits and boosting their competitiveness in the transition to a net-zero economy.

Action is needed in key sectors, many of which require tailored approaches to setting targets. The SBTi provides clarity and guidance on these journeys, including for the forest, land and agriculture and finance sectors.

The SBTi has also launched the world's first Corporate Net-Zero Standard, to ensure that companies’ net-zero targets translate into action that is consistent with achieving a net-zero world by no later than 2050.

We know that governments and business must act together. Business action paired with clear policies and targets result in positively reinforcing ‘ambition loops’ that will accelerate the full decarbonization of every system of the economy. Widespread and ambitious science-based target setting gives governments the clarity and confidence to take bolder action.

We support the integration of science-based target setting into existing climate leadership platforms including UN Caring for Climate, WWF Climate Savers and others.

Our vision is for science-based target setting to become the new normal, creating a thriving economy in harmony with the natural world that sustains us all.

Our impact

The transformation to a net-zero economy is achievable and has already begun.

In 2021, the SBTi entered a period of exponential growth and increasing corporate ambition - doubling the number of new companies setting and committing to set targets, and tripling the rate at which new targets were validated. At the end of 2022, more than 4,000 companies covering over a third of the global economy’s market capitalization, were setting targets or committing to do so via the SBTi.

These companies are leading the way. However, we need every company, in every sector, to join them. The future of our planet depends on this.

The launch of the SBTi Net-Zero Standard ahead of COP26 was a milestone, providing the world’s first framework for corporate net-zero target setting. Anchored in climate science and 1.5°C pathways, the Standard requires companies to make rapid and deep emission cuts, through both near- and long-term science-based targets.

Science-based target setting is already becoming part of the yearly reporting practice of companies and the data infrastructure for institutional investors through incorporation in the CDP questionnaire and scoring.

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