The CDP is an independent, not-for-profit organisation which has established a database of corporate climate change information.  Over 3,000 organisations in more than 60 countries around the world measure and disclose their greenhouse gas emissions and climate change strategies through CDP in order to set reduction targets and make performance improvements.

The Climate Disclosure Standards Board (CDSB) is an international organisation which seeks to achieve the integration of climate change-related information into mainstream corporate reporting.

The goal of climate change reporting taxonomy  is to reflect information requirements for voluntary or mandatory filings submitted by listed or non-listed companies to different authorities around the world, initially focused on company disclosure with requirements stemming from the climate change reporting framework and CDP.

The overall intent is to have an overarching taxonomy that is able to accommodate the main reporting schemes and arrive at a common representation of the main aspects so as to allow different systems to process and communicate climate change data effectively and efficiently.

The CDP indicates that the development of the taxonomy has been prioritised in response to increasing interest in sustainability reporting, such as the outcomes from the Rio+20 conference and the recent announcement by the UK government to introduce mandatory carbon reporting from 2013.  The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) has also released an XBRL taxonomy for tagging sustainability data in reports.

Consultation on the draft taxonomy continues until 24 September 2012.  Click for press release (link to CDP website).