Edison Electric Institute, American Gas Association update ESG/sustainability reporting template to include natural gas metrics

The Edison Electric Institute (EEI) and the American Gas Association (AGA) announced Monday the update of the EEI environmental, social, governance, and sustainability (ESG/sustainability) template to include reporting metrics related to natural gas operations.

“The updated EEI ESG/sustainability reporting template will enable energy companies to provide the financial sector with more uniform, consistent, and transparent ESG/sustainability data and information that now includes important natural gas metrics,” EEI President Tom Kuhn said.

The natural gas distribution companies participating in the ESG/sustainability reporting template will publish their 2017 data in the coming weeks and months. AGA noted that EEI, AGA, and their member companies would continue to work with investors to refine the metrics. EEI and AGA plan to fully incorporate the natural gas metrics into the Version 2 EEI ESG/sustainability template in mid-2019, which companies will use to report 2018 data.

“AGA’s new ESG metrics build on the excellent work of EEI and will provide simple, transparent voluntary sustainability reporting for natural gas distribution, transmission, storage, gathering and boosting operations,” AGA President and CEO Dave McCurdy said. “Working with our members, we developed metrics tailored to our sector and incorporated input from investors and stakeholders. Natural gas utilities have a strong track record of success with voluntary initiatives in the areas of safety and sustainability, and we anticipate a similar robust participation in this new ESG initiative.”

EEI-led stakeholder working groups developed the EEI ESG/sustainability template over the past two years. The template encourages voluntary reporting of ESG/sustainability information in quantitative and qualitative formats. The pilot ESG/sustainability reporting template launched in December 2017, and Version 1 was launched in August 2018.

“EEI’s pilot and Version 1 ESG/sustainability reporting template had a high level of member participation and was well-received by investors, key stakeholders, and customers,” Kuhn said. “We are pleased to partner with AGA on this important initiative and look forward to continuing our work on future versions of the EEI ESG/sustainability template.”