Global Compliance and Sustainability Reporting Demands Place Growing Burden on Asset-Intensive Industries

Abstract

Overview and Background Sustainability has become an operational, fiscal, and strategic imperative for business, resulting in greater senior executive visibility and focus. For many companies, sustainability is more than an environmental concern. Mature sustainability programs can support bottom-line growth by identifying opportunities to reduce operational costs, increase efficiency and reduce risks. As environmental reporting protocols become more complex and require more robust information, the ability to track and manage emissions is essential. Broad-based environmental tracking requires complete and accurate data to advance effective business decisions. Today’s HSE reporting requirements also highlight the need for enterprise-level information management that can streamline data management and drive best practices. Top corporate sustainability drivers revolve around cost reduction, managing compliance risk, securing revenues, and meeting stakeholder expectations. Potentially, the most impactful initiatives are aligned with heavy industrial production processes. In addition, emerging unconventional E&P processes require the ability to track and benchmark environmental effects to maintain a license to operate. Increasing scrutiny by governments, stakeholders and the public means higher risks related to accurate and timely disclosure. Generating meaningful outcomes from a sustainability strategy is dependent on the ability to efficiently track and aggregate environmental data from numerous sources across operations and deliver up-to-the minute information to advance proactive decisions. Effective collection and calculation of environmental information is the first step toward development of a formal strategy for HSE management, with an eye toward establishing a path to sustainability. This paper presents a new approach to compliance and sustainability reporting that progressively includes other stakeholders as it bridges the gap between operations and enterprise reporting needs.1