Irish business making climate progress, but stronger government action needed to accelerate transition
5th November 2026
Business in the Community Ireland (BITCI) today published From Ambition to Delivery: What Business Needs to Accelerate Progress Featuring the 2026 Climate Transition Scorecard. The report highlights the challenges facing some of Ireland’s most ambitious sustainability leaders and aims to stimulate dialogue between business and government on how to accelerate the transition to a decarbonised, nature-positive economy.
Contributors identified eight priorities for government action, including improved grid infrastructure, stronger incentives, better policy coordination, procurement systems that reward sustainability improvements, and greater public support for transition-enabling infrastructure.
Meaghan Carmody, BITCI Senior Sustainability Adviser and report lead said,
“With COP31 beginning next week, government support for business must strengthen to accelerate emissions reductions in a just and nature-positive way. At the same time, business must maintain ambition on climate and nature, creating the mandate for government to implement bold policies that provide the certainty needed to unlock further investment. Ireland’s emissions have fallen for four consecutive years, but they must decline four-and-a-half times faster than they did in 2025 if we are to meet our 2030 targets.”
The report also includes the 2026 Climate Transition Scorecard, the second annual assessment of companies that have signed BITCI’s Accelerate, The Business Pact for Climate and Nature, committing to develop Climate Transition Plans and reach net-zero emissions by 2050 at the latest.
Conducted independently by the DCU Institute for Climate and Society, the Scorecard evaluates publicly available information across nine areas considered critical to achieving a fair and effective transition to a low-carbon, nature-positive economy. The findings provide insight into both leading practice and the barriers businesses face in delivering climate action at pace.
The 2026 assessment of 16 companies found encouraging signs of progress:
- All ten companies assessed in 2025 improved their overall score, with overall improvements recorded across eight of the nine assessment areas.
- Thirteen companies have reduced emissions from their baseline year.
- Many organisations strengthened governance, climate risk management and reporting of investment in climate and nature projects.
- Many companies published detailed decarbonisation roadmaps with short-, medium- and long-term milestones.
- More companies are beginning to measure and manage nature-related impacts.
- Several organisations have expanded Scope 3 emissions accounting, including more detailed reporting of emissions from key categories such as purchased goods and services and the use of sold products.
Speaking at the launch, Laura Morrison, BITCI Head of Responsible Business said,
“By choosing to be publicly assessed, these companies are demonstrating leadership by helping to shine a light on both the challenges of climate action and potential solutions. The purpose of the research is not to rank companies, but to understand the overall progress of this cohort across the nine Accelerator Areas, and the challenges that exist among them. The 2026 Climate Transition Scorecard shows stronger planning, improved emissions measurement, greater attention to nature impacts and clearer alignment between sustainability objectives and government engagement. This leadership is essential to accelerate climate transition plans and inspire companies at an earlier stage of their sustainability journey.”
Declan White, Chief Executive Officer, Veolia | Ireland, and one of the Pact signatories said,
“Accelerating Ireland’s transition toward a decarbonised, nature-positive economy demands both rigorous private sector accountability and strong enabling public policy. Being assessed alongside progressive business leaders in the 2026 Climate Transition Scorecard reinforces the importance of collective action. For Veolia in Ireland, advancing environmental security means strengthening system-wide resilience across critical water, waste, and energy networks while embedding biodiversity restoration and circular economy principles into everyday operations.”
However, challenges remain. While not common to every company assessed, several report delays in implementing key transition measures such as renewable energy procurement and alternative fuels. Scope 3 emissions reporting remains inconsistent across the sample. Some companies are innovating to reduce absolute Scope 3 emissions, but some are seeing emissions rise – largely due to supply chain and product-related emissions. Approaches to linking sustainability performance with executive remuneration are varied across the group, while outcomes relating to a just transition could not be assessed because few of the companies had established specific targets.
Tomás Sercovich, BITCI CEO said
“We commend the companies involved in this research. Their insights highlight why collaboration between government and business is essential to meeting climate targets, strengthening Ireland’s resilience to climate change and capturing the opportunities of the net-zero economy. Accelerating business action on climate and nature is increasingly a driver of national competitiveness, and we want to see our members enabled to help create a sustainable, low-carbon economy where everyone can thrive.”
Read ‘From Ambition to Delivery – What Business Needs to Accelerate Progress featuring the 2026 Climate Transition Scorecard’ here
Ends
Notes to the Editor:
- Business in the Community Ireland’s purpose is to inspire, challenge and facilitate businesses to bring about a sustainable, low carbon economy and an inclusive society where everyone thrives. We leverage our extensive network and depth of knowledge to guide businesses to embed all aspects of sustainability into their operations. Our programmes and partnerships are designed to bring about measurable improvements in environmental sustainability and social equity.
- Accelerate: The Business Pact for Climate and Nature is a voluntary BITCI initiative designed to encourage companies to, by 2030, commit to set an externally validated net zero by 2050 target and develop a climate transition plan.
- Climate Transition Plans or CTPs are detailed roadmaps outlining an organisation’s approach to reaching its climate targets. They outline how a company will adapt its business model and operations, manage the risks and leverage the opportunities of the climate transition. They are designed to bring climate strategy into core business planning and integrate it into every business function.Started by BITCI in 2024 as part of Accelerate: The Business Pact for Climate and Nature, the Climate Transition Plan Scorecard helps BITCI understand how leading companies are progressing across nine leverage areas critical to a holistic climate transition: Climate targets and progress, Nature, Just Transition, Scope 3, Decarbonisation Levers, Governance, Finance, Risk and Advocacy.
- The 2026 Climate Transition Plan Scorecard is the second annual assessment and was conducted independently by DCU researchers from DCU Business School, DCU School of History and Geography, and DCU School of Communications. Experts assessed 16 companies across the nine Accelerator Areas using publicly available information, including sustainability reports, transition plans, annual reports, governance and risk policies, CDP (Carbon Disclosure Project) disclosures, Taskforce on Climate Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) reports, lobbying policies and company websites. Documents had to have been published by 20 August 2026 to be considered. Companies were required at minimum to have published a Sustainability Report to be included. The number of documents reviewed ranged from five to 37 per company, with a median of 14, with a total review of over 250 publicly available documents. Importantly, the purpose of the Climate Transition Plan Scorecard is to evaluate corporate CTPs, but only half of companies analysed published a stand-alone CTP or equivalent. This variability presents a significant challenge to finding and analysing publicly available climate and sustainability data.
- Participating companies vary significantly in sector, size and maturity, and material issues differ between organisations. The purpose of the research is not to rank companies, but to understand the overall progress of this cohort across the nine Accelerator Areas, helping BITCI to support its members while also informing engagement with government.
- The Scorecard assessed 16 of the 20 signatory companies to BITCI’s ‘Accelerate: The Business Pact for Climate and Nature’ – Arup, Bidvest Noonan, Bord Gáis Energy, Britvic Ireland, Bus Éireann, Deloitte, Equinix, Gather & Gather, Grant Thornton, John Paul Construction, Kyndryl, Mitie, SSE, Tesco, Veolia, and VHI. While this is a small sample of companies, the in-depth analysis provides valuable insights on the challenges to the climate transition in the business sector and the best practices companies are taking to address them. Other signatory companies are Danone, ESW, KSG, and Instantor.
- The UNEP Emissions Gap Report 2026: The Point of Return finds that with global temperature rise set to exceed 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, urgent and stringent cuts to greenhouse emissions are needed to minimize the magnitude and duration of overshoot and return to 1.5°C by the end of the century. Report can be found here: https://wedocs.unep.org/handle/20.500.11822/50038
