Checklist: Measure
and report on your sustainability
performance

You’ve set your sustainability goals and created an action plan to meet them. But no matter what outcomes you’re looking to accomplish, the only way to measure your progress is to set your baseline and track performance of every action item across your real estate portfolio—and adjust your plan where necessary. This also lets you hold yourself accountable and regularly report progress back to stakeholders.

Not sure how to begin measuring and reporting? The following steps will help you monitor and communicate the performance of your sustainability program.

• What should you be measuring? Start with these key environmental metrics:
  • Energy reductions
  • Energy use intensity
  • Water usage
  • Waste reduction and diversion
  • Carbon emissions
• Compare your performance to the industry benchmark for every location on at least an annual basis
• Review and summarize regulatory requirements to determine if/how you are meeting them today and identify available incentives for additional initiatives
• Identify the frameworks you will use to report on your progress, which will guide your approach to data management and reporting. The frameworks will depend on several factors, including your business type:
  • CDP (Carbon Disclosure Project) focuses primarily on greenhouse gas emissions but has grown to address water and forestry issues
  • UNSDG (United Nations Sustainable Development Group) Cooperation Framework guides the entire program cycle, driving planning, implementation, monitoring, reporting and evaluation of collective UN support for achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
  • TCFD (Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures) helps public companies and other organizations more effectively disclose climate-related risks and opportunities through their existing reporting processes
  • GRESB (Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark) focuses on ESG performance in the global commercial real estate sector only—it includes asset- and entity-level disclosures and identifies gaps
  • GRI (Global Reporting Initiative) focuses on corporate social responsibility with an equal weight on ESG factors—it’s heavy on stakeholder engagement to determine materiality
• Implement a centralized data and analytics platform to efficiently automate, aggregate and make sense of how your real estate is performing and identify opportunities for future improvement
  • Using JLL’s data and analytics platform, our clients in 2020 reduced CO2 emissions by 194 million pounds, measuring sustainability performance across nearly 50,000 buildings representing 2.1 billion square feet of space, which tracked to more than $300 million in energy cost savings. The platform provides a transparent, complete look into how you’re performing today along with insights to help you manage and measure performance over time
• Continue refining your KPIs to ensure you’re measuring the right things to achieve the greatest impact
• Celebrate your wins along the way

Continue making progress

By measuring and tracking your sustainability performance, you’ll know how you’re progressing toward your goals and where to adjust along the way. You’ll also be able to hold yourself accountable as you regularly report progress back to your internal and external stakeholders. If you’re having difficulty making progress, an experienced partner can help. Visit our website or contact us to learn more about how to turn your sustainability ambitions into actions.