Net zero needs standards — will ISO 14060 deliver?

The International Organization for Standardization opened a public consultation on the draft version of its Net Zero Standard in June 2026. The draft includes requirements for transition planning, emissions-reduction targets and pathway-setting, net-zero action, and counterbalancing residual emissions. Eve Fraser and Thomas Day write on the New Climate Institute website review the draft and provide some key recommendations.

Key Recommendations for Strengthening the ISO Net Zero Standard

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) opened a public consultation period for the draft version of the ISO 14060 Net Zero Aligned Organizations standard in June 2026.

The draft standard was created through a 2-year-long process that gathered experts from companies, academia and civil society organisations. Many of these experts are also part of national standard bodies from across the world.

It includes requirements for organisations to set emissions reduction targets and pathways, plan their transitions, implement net-zero action and counterbalance residual emissions. Requirements are specified for organisations across sectors and geographies.

This briefing outlines the requirements included in the draft ISO Net Zero Standard, identifies gaps and recommends changes to the text.

What are our key takeaways?

• Requirement to set net-zero targets: Organisations are required to set net-zero targets and must select net-zero pathways according to sectoral and regional context. The standard does not prescribe a net-zero target date, recognising that companies from different regions and sectors may have varying levels of responsibility and capability to address climate change. However, this may create a loophole for very large companies with global value chains to delay reaching net-zero emissions.
• Requirement to set interim targets covering all three emissions scopes: The draft standard requires organisations to set targets that cover all scope 1 and 2 emissions and provides a matrix to evaluate which scope 3 emissions should be covered by emissions reduction targets. The matrix is an interesting addition to the standard conceptually; however, what counts as significant can be interpreted subjectively, which might lead to targets omitting important scope 3 emissions.
• Scope 2 requirements: The current draft allows for both location-based and market-based methods to be used to set and reach interim scope 2 emissions reduction targets, and only location-based for long-term targets. The draft does not specify any additional requirements beyond current scope 2 emissions calculation standards. For greater integrity, the draft should clarify that the GHG Protocol’s latest version of the scope 2 standard must be used.
• Use of Environmental Commodity Certificates: The ‘mitigation hierarchy’ specifies that direct action within the value chain should be prioritised, but we understand that Environmental Commodity Certificates (also known as environmental attribute certificates or activity-pool approaches) can be used to an unlimited extent to reach targets and without any clear safeguards, which raises transparency and integrity concerns.
• Use of activity alignment targets: The draft standard outlines how activity targets can be used. However, their use remains mostly optional. Only targets to transition away from fossil fuel use, deforestation and energy efficiency targets are required.
• Offsetting to achieve targets: While carbon credits cannot be used to offset emissions to reach emissions reduction targets, they can be used to address excess emissions when a target is overshot. For many users of the standard, this may appear contradictory, and it may effectively lead to offsetting and misleading claims.
• Support for carbon dioxide removals: The draft standard introduces requirements and guidance for counterbalancing residual emissions through permanent carbon dioxide removal. However, the definition of permanence lacks integrity, leaving the door open for non-durable CDR to be used to address residual emissions.

External link