Your figures
Nothing is submitted until you ask for the result.
How this is calculated
Why the baseline decides everything
A sustainability-linked facility prices against a target, and a target is only as credible as the starting point it is measured from. Lenders discount — sometimes entirely — a target whose baseline cannot be tested by someone independent.
That is why an unassured baseline is the most common blocker at this stage, well ahead of anything to do with ambition. Getting the measurement right is not the sustainability part of green finance; it is the finance part.
Questions about this tool
Who is this scored against?
The questions reflect what commercial lenders, development finance institutions and green bond reviewers examine in practice: a measured baseline, whether it has been independently tested, a target tied to it, board-level oversight, and the ability to report against it over the life of the facility.
Do we need assurance before raising green finance?
Not always, but an unassured baseline is the most common blocker at this stage, well ahead of anything to do with ambition. A target is priced against its starting point, and a starting point nobody independent has tested gets discounted — sometimes to nothing.
Is this specific to green bonds?
No. The same questions apply to sustainability-linked loans, DFI facilities and, increasingly, to ordinary corporate lending where a bank is managing its own financed emissions. The instrument differs; what gets examined does not, by much.
What do we do if the score is low?
Follow the sequence rather than the total: measurement before targets, targets before instruments. Setting a public target off a baseline you cannot evidence creates a problem that is harder to unwind than the delay would have been.