Base year of scope 3 for validation approval (Financial Institutions)

Criteria
1

Hi all,
I would like to ask about the range of acceptable base year for scope 3 for financial institutions (especially category 15 - financed emissions)

I understand that SBTi has only allowed “two years” prior as valid most recent year inventories (but for validation in 2022, the most recent inventory data submitted can be 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic) and encourages to use the same base year for all their inventories for reasons of consistency.

My questions are,

  1. Is the “two years” criterion applied to all scopes(1,2,3)? namely to all targets?

  2. Will the criteria be the same for validation in 2023? Namely, if companies want to get validation in 2023, can they use 2020 inventory? OR, must they use 2021 inventory at least?

Many thanks,
YoungWoo

2

Hi Youngwoo. For scope 3 targets, we can be a bit more flexible but do ask for the latest possible years to be used, as they will be more reflective of the portfolios. Therefore in 2023, FIs would be expected to use 2021 or sooner, but we can also discuss using 2020 for exceptional cases