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AI in ESG reporting is like having a GPS for your sustainability journey—always keeping you on the right path, rerouting when challenges appear and making sure you don’t accidentally drive off a data cliff.
But surprisingly, many of the sustainability and ESG reporting software out there have yet to introduce artificial intelligence and machine learning into their product capabilities.
We're analyzing five platforms that offer solid AI for ESG purposes so you can see how they'll help you automate sustainability processes and prevent costly mistakes.
How can AI be used for ESG reporting
Generally speaking, AI helps companies go through large amounts of complex data faster, ensure accuracy, and stay compliant with evolving regulations. Zoom in and you’ll discover the various use cases that different AI tools offer:
- Automating data collection and processing: Perhaps one of the most essential capabilities is for the AI mechanism to pull data from invoices, HR systems, and other data sources. All ESG reporting tools should have this feature if you want to get rid of the manual effort and human mistakes in the process.
- Detecting anomalies: Let AI track and analyze datasets for anomalies so you can get early warning signs of discrepancies or data inconsistencies.
- Enhancing scope emissions calculations: Besides the basic calculations, AI-based sustainability tools should automatically match emission factors based on company data. For example, ESG Flo uses AI to match smart emission factors.
- Answering common questions: Generative AI can extract qualitative data from reports, policies, and other documents and answer common disclosure questions.
- Ensuring smooth operations across multiple frameworks: No matter which reporting framework (e.g. GRI, CDP, TCFD) you need to adhere to, you could meet various ESG disclosure requirements in just a couple of clicks.
5 tools using AI in sustainability reporting
We’ve shortlisted the top ESG software options with AI capabilities and looked at how they stand out, what users say about them, and how you can use them.
1. ESG Flo – Best-in-class AI-driven ESG software
ESG Flo is an all-inclusive ESG reporting software that relies on AI to support companies in creating ESG audit-ready metrics from raw data.
ESG Flo’s AI automates data collection and processing across all ESG disclosures by pulling information from invoice documents, HR data, ERP system extracts, supplier data, or geo-spacial data, automatically generating metrics for any reporting framework requirements.
AI use cases:
- When you need to extract invoice data, the AI will pull data from utility invoices in various formats and languages (relying on Large Language Models and Optical Character Recognition)
- For qualitative data extraction, ESG Flo scans documents to highlight relevant sections and answer disclosure questions
- For anomaly detection, the AI will monitor data trends and flags anomalies
- To help you with smart emission factor matching, the tool recommends emission factors to calculate Scope 1-2-3 emissions, without extensive human supervision
- For cross-framework interoperability, its proprietary AI auto-populates data across reporting frameworks, eliminating manual entry needs
‘We’ve automated a very manual process, saving time and resources for other projects. It’s been better tracking, a single source of truth, and much higher visibility,’ says Samuel Shiroff, Senior Director Global Sustainability at EnerSys.
💡Relevant: How EnerSys uses GenAI to drive efficiency, ensure accuracy, and safeguard sustainability & ESG data
Together with a complete ESG tracking software, you can also get professional support from consultants who will help you handle double materiality assessment, gap assessment, CDP submission, and more. This way, you can be completely sure about the accuracy of your reporting efforts.
‘This is a one-stop-shop for us. We don’t have to go to multiple data owners to get information. The tool does exactly what we need it to.’- Sonali Samani, Head of Environmental, Social and Governance at IWG.
2. Workiva – Best for using Gen AI for financial and ESG reporting
Workiva is a cloud-based data management system for compliance and reporting. In particular, you’ll want to turn to its Generative AI for ESG, financial reporting, audit, and risk management purposes alike. The AI also assists in drafting, summarizing, and refining financial and non-financial reports, ensuring consistent tone and high-quality outputs tailored to specific needs.
You can use generative AI features directly within documents, presentations, and spreadsheets to streamline content creation and editing. In their Prompt Library, you can find diverse pre-built prompts tailored for ESG and compliance tasks and get started faster with reporting. Additionally, its native AI tools can compare documents, analyze discrepancies, and summarize thoughts.
But it’s also important to consider the limitations that come along with this ESG tracking software. Some users on G2 point out that ‘The generative AI is new and may need some development.’ and ‘The AI feature is not clear in the Internal Audit SOX feature.’
3. Persefoni – Use of AI for carbon accounting and climate management data
PersefoniAI users praise its “AI-friendly approach” to carbon measurement and reporting but what stands out is the Persefoni Copilot that answers technical questions related to carbon accounting through a chat-like interface.
Persefoni AI further supports businesses with anomaly detections and identifying errors in their Scope 1-2-3 emissions data. You can consider the platform if you want to comply with the most notable carbon accounting standards, including TCFD, CSRD, and the SBTi.
However, this platform primarily focuses on carbon footprint management, (unlike other more comprehensive ESG reporting software on the market). So the AI for ESG capabilities are also somewhat limited to what the platform can do and are influenced by the tool’s occasional shortcomings.
As users state in these quick observations of cons they’ve experienced: ‘The data entry is a bit manual’, ‘I can't create a complete sustainability report in Persefoni’, and ‘There were a few glitches on spreadsheets.’
4. AuditBoard — Best for ESG compliance and risk management
AuditBoard AI is focused on a triad of key factors: audit, risk, and compliance management. This AI tools’ primary focus? Automating time-intensive workflows and sharing smart recommendations.
For example, its Generative AI feature provides a starting point organizations can use to create detailed audit-related content. These include risk and issue statements, control descriptions, test procedures, and executive summaries, saving practitioners hours they’d otherwise spend handling all this manually.
You can also use the AuditBoard AI platform to assess different vendors, auto-generate responses to security and compliance questionnaires, get high-level summaries, analyze trends, and more.
Most current users declare themselves as excited with the AI capabilities this ESG tool provides. This user though focuses a bit more on what they’d like to see in the future in terms of AI for ESG reporting with AuditBoard:
‘Would like more advanced AI and Data Analytics. While these two product features are available, would like for improved usability of the features such as advanced analytics with IT sample populations and connectivity to third party access management systems. Would like improved AI to apply to our control statements and intelligence on analyzing controls and where time savings could be sought free with control activity automation.’
5. Pulsora — Best for smart data mapping
PulsoraAI is still a relatively new feature so we can’t fully grasp its direction yet. Still, the platform currently boasts AI capabilities to automate time-consuming processes like data mapping, decarbonization modeling, and AI in sustainability reporting.
One of PulsoraAI's key features is intelligent data mapping. This allows sustainability teams to reuse data from previous reporting cycles and automatically map it to new frameworks like CDP or GRI.
Need more expert guidance? Test its Copilot feature to get on-demand assistance for sustainability reporting. This can include drafted responses for qualitative metrics and guidance for teams handling complex data requirements.
PulsoraAI also promises to make it simpler for organizations to model their decarbonization pathway as it creates industry-specific, customized pathways for carbon reduction goals. This should be easy to implement as users say the tool easily connects to other apps and provides clarity into your sustainability information.
Be aware though that reporting with Pulsora seems to receive quite a lot of criticism as it’s unproductive and somewhat constraining.
Where to go next?
ESG Flo is the ideal choice to explore first—it's a comprehensive AI-driven solution for tracking and managing sustainability and ESG data, while also calculating and addressing your carbon footprint. Book a free demo to experience the platform firsthand!
