ISSB Releases SASB Standards Interoperability Guide to Unify Sustainable Accounting Disclosure Caliber
The International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) has released the Implementation Alignment Guide between SASB Standards and IFRS S2, aiming to resolve the disclosure caliber conflicts faced by enterprises when complying with both ISSB's sustainability disclosure standards and SASB's industry-specific standards. The guide clarifies unified handling rules for 12 key difference points in climate-related disclosures, including "Scope 3 emission accounting boundaries", "carbon price assumption selection", and "transition risk quantification methods". Meanwhile, it provides example templates for 8 industries such as finance, energy, and manufacturing, helping enterprises reduce the cost of dual disclosure. Prior to this, the interoperability guide between Europe's European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) and International Financial Reporting Standards Sustainability Disclosure Standards (IFRS S) has been officially launched, and this collaboration between ISSB and SASB will further promote the convergence of global sustainable accounting standards.
From the perspective of industry practice, SASB Standards have previously accumulated extensive application experience in industry-specific disclosure requirements, while ISSB's IFRS S standards focus on building a globally unified sustainable information disclosure framework. The caliber differences between the two have put transnational enterprises in a dilemma of "repetitive disclosure and inconsistent calibers". Especially in the field of climate-related information disclosure, problems such as ambiguous Scope 3 emission accounting boundaries and lack of unified standards for carbon price assumptions not only increase enterprises' disclosure costs but also reduce the comparability of information among different entities. The newly released alignment guide accurately addresses this industry pain point and provides clear operational guidelines for enterprises by clarifying unified handling rules for 12 core difference points.
At the implementation support level, the example templates for 8 key industries are of great practical value. Taking the energy industry as an example, the guide clarifies the accounting boundaries of the upstream raw material extraction link in the supply chain for Scope 3 emissions of oil and gas extraction enterprises, and also provides a reference framework for carbon price assumption selection, offering flexible adjustment plans in combination with policy requirements in different regions; for the financial industry, the guide focuses on standardizing the quantitative indicators and disclosure formats of transition risks in green credit business, helping financial institutions accurately disclose climate-related financial risks. These specific guidelines will greatly lower the threshold for enterprises to apply the standards and improve disclosure efficiency and information quality.
From the perspective of global standard convergence, this collaboration between ISSB and SASB is of milestone significance. Previously, the alignment between Europe's ESRS and IFRS S standards has laid the foundation for global sustainable standard collaboration, and SASB Standards have a large number of enterprise users in North America, Asia-Pacific and other regions. The release of this guide will further integrate global sustainable disclosure standard resources and reduce regional standard barriers. Industry experts point out that with the implementation of various alignment guides, global sustainable accounting disclosure will gradually move away from the stage of "multiple parallel standards and fragmented disclosure", providing investors with more comparable sustainable information and a more unified reference for enterprises to formulate sustainable development strategies.
IASB Issues Examples of Climate Change-Related Uncertainty Disclosures in Financial Statements to Strengthen Accounting Reflection of Climate Risks
The International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) has recently released Examples of Uncertainty Disclosures in Financial Statements — Taking Climate Change as an Example, aiming to address the problems of insufficient disclosure of climate-related risks in financial statements and poor connection with sustainability reports. The examples clearly require enterprises to supplement the quantitative impact assessment of climate risks on accounts such as asset impairment, provisions for liabilities, and cash flows in their financial statements, and at the same time disclose risk transmission paths and scenario assumptions to help investors distinguish the boundary of climate information between accounting statements and sustainability disclosures. The IASB emphasizes that this initiative does not add new accounting standards, but guides enterprises to more fully reflect climate uncertainty using existing IFRS standards, which is expected to promote enterprises in more than 120 regions adopting IFRS around the world to improve the transparency of financial information.
Currently, the impact of climate risks on enterprises' financial conditions is becoming increasingly prominent, but most enterprises have vague disclosures in their financial statements, and there are overlaps or disconnections between climate information in sustainability reports, making it difficult for investors to accurately assess risks. The released examples fill this practical gap, guiding enterprises to visualize the impact of climate risks from a financial perspective by clarifying quantitative assessment requirements and disclosure frameworks. For example, in the asset impairment account, enterprises need to calculate the changes in the recoverable amount of relevant assets in combination with scenarios such as extreme weather and carbon emission reduction policies; in cash flow forecasting, factors such as supply chain disruptions and rising operating costs caused by climate risks need to be included. This not only helps improve the decision-making relevance of financial information but also promotes the coordinated connection between financial statements and sustainability disclosures.
Published on January 3, 2026
