Corporate sustainability reporting has become increasingly important in recent years due to rising demand from regulators and stakeholders for transparency and accountability. Many rating agencies assess companies’ sustainability performance, which is mainly based on the companies’ own reporting. However, manually evaluating the informativeness and truthfulness of this information can be challenging and time-consuming.
To address this challenge, a project has been proposed to explore how air pollutants data can complement or enhance ESG reporting. The project aims to support corporate sustainability reporting in compliance with Environment, Social, and Corporate Governance principles to achieve transparency and data accuracy.
The project proposes the use of two separate datasets: nitrogen dioxide (NO2) concentrations and sulfur dioxide (SO2) emission catalogues. NO2 is a polluting gas produced from fossil fuel combustion processes, transportation, energy production, and industrial processes. SO2 is a polluting gas emitted by power plants, metal smelters, and oil and gas facilities.
To assess the air polluting emission over mining sites, the NO2 tropospheric columns derived by TROPOMI/S5P will be used. These emissions are expected over open pits from transportation, energy production, processing plant, and other extraction activities. The annual SO2 emission estimates based on OMI, OMPS, and TROPOMI SO2 observations will also be utilized.
The study analyzed four copper mines and one smelter, including two Peruvian copper mines (Caujone and Toquepala) and the Ilo copper smelter, where the metal from the two mines is getting processed. The annual mean tropospheric NO2 concentrations based on TROPOMI/S5P over the Sentinel and Kansanshi mines in Zambia were also observed.
Despite the Cobre Panama mine (belonging to First Quantum) not being detected due to unfavourable retrieval locations, the study was able to carry out most of the annual calculations, which showed a positive correlation between the annual reports published by the companies and the analysis.
Therefore, the results of this study show great potential for the usage of satellite data to validate and produce sustainability reports within the ESG policies. However, to hold and process the vast amount of satellite-based observations, proper database systems and hardware need to be equipped.
In summary, the proposed approach to using air pollutants’ data to complement or enhance ESG reporting has the potential to improve corporate sustainability reporting and increase transparency and data accuracy. The use of satellite data to validate and produce sustainability reports within the ESG policies can also aid in meeting the increasing demand for transparency and accountability.
