At the Perseus 2025 AGM it was reported that Perseus is:

• evolving from ‘financing green’ to embedded sustainable finance creating a potential addressable market of £5-10 billion
• adding gas, extending energy coverage from Scope 2 (electricity) to Scope 1
• estimated, via its existing members, to have potential reach of over 1 million UK SMEs and cover over 70% of use cases
• continuing to advance ‘Perseus Ready’ implementations with commercial members
• running a live sandbox (equivalent to production) for use by Carbon Accounting Providers (CAPs) and Energy Data Providers (EDPs) to develop solutions
• working with Perseus members to develop go-to-market capabilities to support hundreds of thousands of SMEs
• exploring integration with Open Banking to enable cross-sector interoperability
• producing XBRL outputs to enable integration with financial reporting systems
• pioneering the development of a voluntary, cross-sector Smart Data scheme, aligned with the UK Data Act and supported by an openly-licensed digital public infrastructure (DPI) architecture for secure data sharing 

“Perseus makes it easier for everyone to do their carbon calculations properly, and comfortably moves us years ahead of the most stringent proposed updates to the GHG Protocol. This is exactly why Sage intends to roll out a Perseus enabled product to make reporting easier for hundreds of thousands of UK SMEs.”

George Sandilands, Vice President, Sage Earth

From financing green to embedded sustainable finance

For much of the last decade, ‘green finance’ has focused on funding individual projects: a retrofit here, a solar installation there. Important, but limited. 

Perseus marks a shift to something far more systemic: it moves beyond financing green to embedding sustainable finance by integrating trusted, verifiable emissions data directly into everyday accounting and financial decision-making.

This evolution means Perseus can be applied across the whole SME market, not just specialist green products. Rather than expecting SMEs to seek out solutions themselves – something most lack the time or expertise to do – Perseus brings trusted insights to where they are (e.g. inside their existing accounting, banking and carbon applications). 

Perseus can support lending, credit and debit products, and even savings accounts, allowing sustainability performance to be reflected wherever financial decisions are made. The impact on SMEs is significant: personalised insights, lower reporting costs, easier access to capital for energy-efficiency upgrades, and new space for financial innovation. By making sustainability data usable at scale, Perseus aims to help turn ‘net zero’ from a niche ambition into a normal feature of how the economy works.

“As a leading smart data initiative, Perseus is developing guardrails for assurable data to support finance and supply chain decisions towards a sustainable economy.”

Hannah Gilbert, Director of Sustainability, British Business Bank

Access TNFD’s full report here

What does good nature data look like?

Working across multidisciplinary stakeholder teams, we identified seven key principles for high-quality nature datasets, acknowledging that nature data should be:

• Transparent and reproducible
• Credible
• Accurate and complete
• Relevant and decision-useful
• Accessible and usable
• Legal, ethical, privacy protecting
• Networked and compatible

Our Process

TNFD provided a roadmap of use cases, which we used as a foundation to work from. From this, our user-needs led approach helped define who the data users were as we developed a set of recommendations and principles that could lay the groundwork for nature data that supports financial decision-making.

“The Taskforce is very clear that its focus and contribution is on addressing use cases specific to corporations and financial institutions”

TNFD: A roadmap for upgrading market access to decision-useful nature-related data

Findings from the pilot testing of proposed nature data principles:

After evaluating 40 existing datasets against these principles, we confirmed that none fully met the standards required for global reporting or investment use. This exposed a critical gap for the financial sector: the absence of reliable, comparable, and standardised nature data needed to direct capital toward nature-positive outcomes.

“We tested 40 datasets against robust criteria for decision-useful nature data and found that none of them fully met the principles required for global reporting and investment needs.” Lewis Just, Lead Researcher

Understanding the barriers of nature-based data

A key reason for this gap lies in the complexity of nature data. Unlike carbon, which can be measured through a single metric such as tonnes of CO₂, nature spans many interconnected systems including water, soil, species, forests, and many more. Each uses different metrics, standards, and methods of measurement, making it extremely difficult to compare results across regions, sectors, or reporting frameworks.

Without harmonisation, financial institutions face a fragmented landscape where nature-related risks are hard to identify or value, and progress toward biodiversity goals is difficult to measure.

IB1’s approach brings structure and clarity to this complexity: developing guiding principles to support better quality, comparable, and decision-ready nature data that can help direct financial flows toward positive environmental outcomes.

Nature loss isn’t just an environmental issue, it’s an economic one

“Reducing nature data barriers is key to enabling effective nature-related reporting and accelerating action to halt and reverse nature loss.” (TNFD)

The impact of nature-related financial risk is widespread and financial institutions currently lack the data needed to measure and manage their nature-related financial risks. For instance, UK Banks could avoid potential losses of 4–5 % of loan-book value if they’re able to anticipate and price risks more accurately. For governments, making nature risk visible could help to avert $2.7 trillion annual GDP loss by 2030.

To unlock the power of nature data and positively shift financial investment, we need better access to high-quality, trustworthy nature data. But access alone isn’t enough, how that data is shared and governed is equally important.

Balancing openness with responsible governance

At first glance, it seems there’s a simple solution: make all nature data open and accessible, right? Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. And, in fact, not all data should be open.

For instance, sharing the precise locations of endangered species could make them more vulnerable to poaching. For example, GPS tracking data intended to help conserve rhinos could be exploited by poachers to locate the animals. Similarly, satellite-derived coral reef maps — created to support conservation — could be misused by developers and industrial fishing fleets to identify and exploit those same ecosystems.

That’s why responsible governance is crucial. Data providers must retain control and ownership over their datasets to prevent misuse and ensure that data serves its intended purpose: protecting and restoring nature.

NOVA (Networked, Open, Verifiable Architecture)

Our NOVA principles were developed to guide us to outcomes that are interoperable, scalable, and aligned with existing standards, ensuring that data can be shared and used responsibly.

Applied through the lens of nature data, this means that sensitive information, such as species locations, is only accessible to those granted explicit permission, safeguarding wildlife while still enabling actionable insights for conservation and investment.

COP30 Brazil

IB1’s principles and recommendations for this project were formed to help TNFD understand what good nature data looks like, so that financial flows can shift towards investments that help, not harm, the planet.

With COP30 in Brazil now underway, the spotlight turns to a country that holds some of the world’s richest biodiversity and largest nature datasets. At its launch event in São Paulo on Thursday, November 6th, TNFD published its recommendations for upgrading the nature data value chain for market participants. This included a blueprint to govern, launch, operate and finance a Nature Data Public Facility (NDPF).

Moderated by Hannah Cool, COO, Bankers for Net Zero (B4NZ), the panel also included: 

• Jessica Bingham, Head of Sustainability Strategy, ACCA. 
• Tomas van der Heijden, CEO, Briink
• Sir Andrew Steer, Professor of Practice, Economics and Sustainability, LSE
• Danielle Boyd, ESG Manager, M&G Investments

Perseus is supporting UK SME decarbonisation efforts by unlocking green finance from banks and lenders. It does this by automating access to assurable data to support lending decisions and related sustainability reporting.

In this episode, we speak with Tony Greenham, Managing Director of Sustainability at the British Business Bank to hear his insights on the role of finance in accelerating SME decarbonisation.

00:00 – Intro to British Business Bank – Role, funding impact, focus on businesses outside London.

03:00 – Small Businesses & Net Zero – Why SMEs are essential for meeting climate goals and the challenges they face.

05:00 – Carbon Reporting & Costs – Viewing carbon as a business cost, importance of measuring, and not letting reporting block action.

07:45 – UK Industrial Strategy – £4bn Industrial Strategy Fund and priority sectors, including clean energy and agritech.

10:10 – Project Perseus – Making emissions measurement simple (starting with electricity) and potential expansion to other inputs.

14:55 – Demand for Sustainability Data – Banks, investors, and corporate supply chains using data for financing and contracts.

17:43 – Political Climate & Long-term Investment – Navigating net zero backlash, focusing on commercial benefits, and future-proof investing.

The goal is to arrive at an integrated, robust and detailed set of recommendations and principles for nature data that will meet the future assessment and reporting needs of market participants.

TNFD has identified the need for a strategic, long-term approach that addresses distributed and decentralised data sharing with a Nature Data Public Facility (NDPF) for market participants. Rather than creating a central database, this will focus on the adoption of robust data sharing criteria (Principles) to enable markets to discover, access and use disclosures.

The government-backed initiative has developed a set of disclosure recommendations and guidance that encourage and enable businesses and financial institutions to report and act on their nature-related dependencies, impacts, risks and opportunities. TNFD’s integrated assessment approach, LEAP, aims to help organisations conduct the due diligence necessary to inform disclosure statements aligned with the TNFD recommendations.

By improving access to decision-useful, nature-related data for markets, TNFD aims to enable the widespread adoption, monitoring and implementation of its recommendations.. IB1 will employ its Icebreaking process, contributing to the delivery of a set of principles that address data sensitivity, verification and assurability. The collaboration will identify nature-related data providers and data layers that are of specific relevance to corporate and financial use cases of corporate reporting, science-based target setting and transition planning.

IB1 will help to establish the foundational principles and practices to support this, which can be adopted as best practice by nature-related data providers to meet the needs of the markets – financial institutions and corporates adopting frameworks such as TNFD’s. These recommendations will help to drive global reporting solutions that are interoperable, scalable, aligned with current data standards, and that enable data providers to retain control and ownership of their data. This will support the broader market-based nature data value chain to develop value-adding data solutions. 

If you (or someone in your network) would like to learn about opportunities  to contribute to this work, we will be conducting interviews and hosting insightful workshops: contact icebreaking@ib1.org  

The Perseus pilot – in which banks will allow Perseus monthly emissions information to be used in the decision making process for one or more green loans – represents a huge step towards automating reporting for UK SMEs, bridging the gap between real-world energy data and financial decision making.

We’re speaking to those involved in Perseus – from Banks, Carbon Accounting Providers, non-profits and policymakers – to explore what the pilot will mean for their business, their customers, and the broader net-zero transition.

In our latest conversation, Conrad Langridge from Sage discusses the challenges SMEs face in carbon reporting, particularly around education, data accuracy, and complexity. Through Perseus, Sage aims to simplify these challenges, enabling SMEs to easily track their emissions through smart meter data and detailed analysis, helping businesses save money and reduce their carbon footprint.

Timestamps

00:00 – Introduction to Conrad Langridge and Sage Earth

01:00 – Sage’s net-zero strategy overview

02:40 – How Sage supports SMEs on carbon accounting

03:22 – Common struggles SMEs face in carbon emissions reporting

07:30 – The shift from traditional accounting to carbon accounting

08:54 – Sage’s role in educating SMEs and accountants in carbon accounting

09:53 – Advantages of smart meters for SMEs

13:00 – The value Perseus brings to carbon accounting providers: Granularity & Accuracy

16:30 – The wider adoption of smart technology and data sharing trends

19:00 – Conrad’s experience and perspective on Project Perseus’s organisation and momentum

Transcript

Conrad: Conrad Langridge from Sage, the accounting, HR and payroll software company that you all know and love. Probably recognised from the Rugby if you’ve been watching that recently. But I work for Sage Earth, which is the carbon accounting sort of body or business unit within Sage. So, yeah. So Sage carbon accounting, it’s as the sort of name suggests, it’s a carbon accounting solution, which helps businesses better understand their environmental impact and sort of start to build strategies on how they can reduce their impacts. Yeah.

Ross: Yeah. No. Really interesting. And you’re sort of going into it there, but could you go more in depth on, you know, Sage’s plans in the net zero space? For yourself, you know, in terms of carbon carbon emissions.

Conrad: Yeah. So if we’re looking if we think about Sage’s net zero strategy, it largely sort of falls into two buckets. One is getting Sage to net zero. So these are looking at all of the you know our offices, how we commute, all of those sort of things, which probably make about 20% of our emissions. Then the two big buckets are: the use of our products, so people actually using Sage solutions and then also our suppliers. So all of the people we spend money with, marketing agencies, office management, that sort of stuff. So we’ve got that’s one part of our strategy. But we’ve also got SMBs to net zero so this is looking at small businesses and small and medium sized businesses and understanding their impact on the planet. And we’ve worked out that the emissions of our customers alone is in the tens of thousands of orders of magnitude greater than Sage’s impact. So, you know, we obviously work with businesses across all different sectors. But, just a few thousand construction companies is going to have a greater impact than a big software company. So yeah, so we’ve got this big opportunity to support small and medium sized businesses across the globe. And that’s sort of one of our biggest parts of our sustainability strategy is doing just that. Not only are we offering carbon accounting, carbon footprinting functionality to SMBs directly through Sage Earth or Sage carbon accounting, but we also do it through an API service. So we’ve been working with a number of banks including NatWest, who are part of the project Perseus initiative, and we work with others as well. So we’re offering those carbon accounting API services to sort of a broader range of enterprise businesses and banks.

Ross: Yeah, that’s really interesting. On that, I was going to ask, you know, what problems do SMEs come to you with when they’re trying to report their emissions? What kind of things do they struggle with?

Conrad: Yeah. So thinking about SMEs and where they struggle from a net zero or carbon accounting perspective, education is probably the biggest piece. We went to Accountex a couple of years ago and we polled their generally accountant audience there, but also includes sort of businesses. Everyone, nearly everyone knew climate change. A few knew net zero. But then as soon as you get into the sort of the sort of language which you really need to know about things like scopes and carbon accounting, people didn’t understand that terminology. And really, to build a sustainability strategy, you need a bit more of a sort of an understanding in terms of education. So education is a big piece. Money is a blocker, but it’s not often the biggest blocker from my view. The blocker is, the education and understanding of how to use the software and what information to capture. And then the nuance on all of the details, which goes into like building a strategy and understanding which parts of your carbon footprint are really material, so where you want to focus your energy. So that’s, I guess, where they struggle.

But using a tool like ours. We’d like to think the process is nice and simple. We take them through that journey. We also have a net zero hub, which does that sort of upfront educational scene setting and building the business case. But yeah, the tool really, as I say, hopefully takes them through that journey to make it easier, but then also gives them the hotspot analysis, which allows them to see which areas of their business have the material impact. So I think that’s where actually the biggest learnings come for small and medium sized businesses. Suddenly they can see where they actually need to focus their energy. And I think from a Perseus perspective, the same thing is true, right? So scope two is a really important part of a carbon footprint. Not always the biggest, but it’s one which is always sort of in the control of the business. It’s one of the levers they have an impact over, unlike some things within scope three, like your supply chain, which is much harder to manipulate. So yeah, looking at scope two and being able to see the emissions associated with your electricity consumption allows businesses to see; in terms of how they’re operating, what changes they can make. So linked to the benefits of smart meters, if you can see your business is using electricity, you know, at a peak time and you’re doing lots of peak consumption, you’re going to see your carbon footprint’s potentially higher. And normally, your bills will be higher. Whereas if you’re using off-peak, you’ll be able to reduce your emissions and your costs.

Project Perseus allowing us to connect to smart data meters is going to allow businesses to see when those emissions are ramping up and start to control that. Yes, it’s great the emissions are likely to be lower but the big thing for small businesses is they’re going to pay a lot less for their electricity.

Ross: Yeah, that’s really good. It’s really interesting that you brought up that education, guidance piece as well. Because if I think of accounting in the traditional sense, not carbon accounting, I can see how you’ve developed that and then moved into carbon accounting and grown that guidance for businesses, which is really good to see.

Conrad: Yeah, I guess I’ve got a follow up point on that. So if you think about financial services or accountants within a business, often they’re the trusted advisor for all of those things to do with money, cashflow, all that sort of stuff. And, when it comes to carbon accounting and net zero, businesses are going to need the same sort of support. Well, they can either educate people internally to bring them up to speed, or they can go to a carbon accountant. But more and more, there are loads of great carbon accountants. Well, sorry, there are carbon accountants and they’re great, but there’s not loads of them, so there’s not really enough. Well, there’s definitely not enough to go around. So we either need to get way more carbon accountants or we need to educate accountants in carbon accounting so they can be the trusted advisor for the thousands of small businesses they work with. And we’re seeing that trend at Sage, we see increasingly, numbers of accounting firms who were traditional accounting firms a few years ago, turn and either focus on carbon accounting as their big sort of differentiator in market, or they add it as a subsidiary service, which is giving them a new revenue stream. And, I don’t know if it’s just the ones we speak to, but all of them are doing really well because there’s so many businesses, small businesses out there who are looking for this support and accountants are doing, you know, a great job at educating themselves on it. Even across a carbon account there’s no one who’s sort of nailed that. It’s not a direct, exact science like accounting is. With accounting, you can count every penny and things can, you know, line up perfectly with the carbon accounting. There’s sort of boundaries in which things can be shifted or you can sort of pull things in and out of scope. And so it’s not a perfect science yet. So just starting or just getting your SMBs on that journey is really the best place to be.

Ross: Yeah, definitely. And like you said, once you know, we start integrating smart meters more, we can get more reliable data for improving that as well.

Conrad: Yeah, I think the benefits from smart meters, there’s kind of two sides to it. I see for SMBs or SMEs the benefit is the smart meter even at that end, there’s loads of benefits for them. Being able to see when you’re using your electricity, using electricity off peak, going from like a fixed meter where you pay, you know, they’re taking that money from you, whatever. There’s the current system and this is how I’ve got at home, admittedly, I’ve not got a smart meter for my sins. But I’ll be billed up front and I’ll be paying for electricity, which I’ve not used for like months and months, and it builds up and I get all this credit. But for a small business, that’s actually cash flow, which could be worked into much better effect within their business. And there’s all these different benefits paying for electricity that you’ve actually used, automating it so you don’t have to report your electricity consumption back to a provider, seeing it in like a smart environment so you can log on and it’s just there rather than thinking about your smart meter every, few months and you forget about it. So there’s loads of benefits from a small and micro sized business perspective on smart meters. And then there’s a sort of subsidiary benefit which is a better understanding of your carbon footprint. And again, why do you need to know your carbon footprint? There’s obviously great benefits from a sustainability perspective, but businesses need this information for a whole host of other reasons, even small businesses. So if they’re looking to do business with central government or the NHS, you need a carbon reduction plan, PPN 0621, if you’re working with a big supplier, say for example, you work with Sage or you work with Sainsbury’s or whatever, suppliers are going to be asking for carbon footprint data to feed into their emissions reporting.

But you’ve also got banks. Increasingly, banks are going to their small businesses and asking them for carbon data including scope two electricity consumption, and offering them loans based on their net zero trajectory. So if you’re a small business that has completed a carbon footprint and has got a net zero plan, you’re a much lower risk than the exact same business within your sector who hasn’t started that journey. Because there’s a lot of risk associated with your activity. And the fact that you’ve not even started looking at that is a bit of a red flag to banks. So if they can start working with small businesses who are clued up on all of this stuff, even if they’re in a riskier sector, there’s more likely that business will come through and actually become profitable, will remain profitable. So yeah, a whole host of benefits.

Ross: Yeah, definitely. And I think I’m just thinking there, obviously I can see if we sort of move into Perseus here a bit. It was always very clear to me the benefits for small businesses because you can access green financing. And then for banks, you know, they’ve kind, if you use that carrot stick thing, they’ve got regulation behind them where they’re having to report on this. But then for carbon accounting firms where do you see the benefit of this work more generally and Perseus?

Conrad: There’s a whole bunch of benefits for carbon accountants and carbon accounting software providers. For me, probably one of the biggest things is granularity and accuracy. And with that comes trust and traceability and just general confidence around carbon accounting. So our current methodology, we’d typically or one of the methodologies we would use, would be understanding what someone spends on their electricity consumption, and we could read this from their accounts really quickly. But with that, that might be, you know, a month’s worth of energy usage of which we don’t know whether they’ve used that in peak or off peak or when it was a particularly windy day and there was lots of renewables in the grid, or if it was sort of peak times during EastEnders and there was no wind, or when there was no wind and the sun was shining and it was like natural gas was 70% of the grid. So we can’t see that within our system. So any estimate on carbon footprint is exactly that, an estimate, and that sort of over a year or average out. And it won’t actually be too far from the truth. But month by month, it could be sort of wildly or wildly inaccurate. But moving to a smart meter data reading and going from monthly data to Half hourly data just reduces that error risk within that calculation.

So that’s one thing. It improves the number the user sees. But also with that old methodology, if a business makes a change to their carbon footprint or their consumption, the only way you really recognise that is from reduction in cost. And that would come from moving to an off peak piece. But actually with the 30 minute reading, you would be able to see the direct changes more clearly. So if someone had moved all of their charging to overnight or at different times, but perhaps the price hadn’t changed, we’d still be able to see the benefit from a carbon reduction perspective, and all of that would be tracked within the system. So it just gives, it’s like that positive feedback loop so a business can make changes to their operations. And with this Perseus model, they’ll be able to see those changes within their carbon footprint the next day because the information would be there. Versus waiting a month and not really knowing if you’ve made a difference, you have made a difference, but it’s not actually recorded because of the existing methodology.

Ross: Yeah, that’s really interesting getting that kind of instant behavioural change. But for whole businesses. Sort of going off on a tangent a little bit, you know, there’s a big push now from smart data from governments and there’s more recognition now of this kind of work. Are you seeing that, you know, influence with the banks you work with or the businesses, whether there’s more willingness to open up to, you know, open data, smart data, and these kind of areas of work?

Conrad: I think because it’s such a, it’s like a topic which touches society at large. It’s such a big trend. I definitely think the adoption of these technologies is just happening across the board. But I think that’s just as the general public gets on board with this sort of technology in their lives. I think that’s where the biggest shift is, because I think you can see trends within enterprise businesses adopting different technology. But that’s only the sort of very few people who sort of operate in that sort of business landscape. But for something like smart meter adoption and amongst micro and SMEs. That’s really just a reflection of society much more broadly. And there’s so many, you know, when you talk, think about micro micro-businesses and small businesses. There’s literally millions of them. So it’s just like, is the general public seeing this adoption of technology? And it’s generally. Yes. So that’s what the trend is. There’s not like a quick shift like you’d see in a sort of enterprise where you only only see like a few thousand people need to be convinced it’s the right thing to do. And those people are looking out for things which they can do to adopt. This is millions of people who have got millions of other things to worry about. So the behaviour change is a lot slower, but it’s really positive, I’d say.

Ross: Yeah. Those are most of my questions. But is there anything more, you know, on Perseus, on the pilot specifically that you wanted to talk about? Basically, how it’s going.

Conrad: Yeah. So I guess I’ve been involved with Perseus for a couple of years. Since it’s sort of ideation, really. And I’ve always been impressed at how well it’s run, from an organisation point of view. Yeah, the organisation, the structure, the sort of this is what we’re going to achieve in year one. And this is the sort of process in which we’re going to do it, and this is how we’re going to engage with the stakeholders who are on board and the sort of the working group structure, all of that sort of stuff, I’ve been really impressed with. I’ve been involved with other sort of similar projects which launch with the same amount of excitement, but the momentum isn’t kept. And that’s not because people aren’t excited by it, but it’s because it’s not run properly and the expectations aren’t set and the operational structure isn’t in place for it to work well. And I think Project Perseus does have that super you know, the organisational structure, the AGMs, the updates, the email updates, the different working groups, all work to keep people, to keep the many stakeholders on board so people know what’s going on. So yeah, I’d say that’s one of the best parts of it, is essential what keeps it going.

The upcoming Perseus pilot – in which banks will allow Perseus monthly emissions information to be used in the decision making process for one or more green loans – represents a huge step towards automating reporting for UK SMEs, bridging the gap between the real and financial economy.

In the lead up to the pilot, we’re speaking to those involved in Perseus – from Banks, Carbon Accounting Providers, non-profits and policymakers – to explore what the pilot will mean for their businesses, their customers, and the broader net-zero transition.

In this conversation, Ian O’Donnell MBE from the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) talks about being a voice for the small business community, sharing insights on how to empower SMEs to report their carbon emissions effectively. With SMEs accounting for 99% of UK businesses and nearly 50% of business emissions, they face significant barriers to carbon reporting, including limited resources, restricted access to energy data, and complex landlord-tenant relationships. The FSB continues to advocate for stronger government support, standardised carbon accounting, and financial incentives to ensure SMEs can play a vital role in the UK’s transition to net zero.

Timestamps

[00:00] Introduction: Ian O’Donnell, Federation of Small Businesses (FSB)
[00:40] Defining the small business community: The importance of representing micro-businesses
[01:40] SME challenges: Reporting carbon emissions, resources, and limitations due to tenancy arrangements
[03:17] SMEs represent around 50% of UK business emissions; importance of government support
[04:33] Value of Project Perseus for FSB: Simplifying SME emissions reporting, particularly scope 1 and scope 2 emissions
[05:55] Working through challenges of data accessibility with Perseus
[06:40] Simplifying carbon accounting by connecting SMEs with existing tools
[08:35] Main barriers for SMEs engaging with Perseus and opportunities to improve uptake
[10:00] Future of Perseus & Future use cases: Water, electricity and gas.
[10:35] UK Governments role: Need for targeted SME education and tailored support. Differentiating big / small business
[12:40] Landlord-tenant challenge: Impacts SME’s ability to invest in energy improvements
[13:45] Financing complexities: How tenancy duration affects investment decisions for SMEs
[15:00] Geopolitical trends and their impact on SME commitments to sustainability
[16:30] Importance of consistency and stable deadlines for SMEs in sustainability strategies
[17:05] Closing remarks: Simplicity, accurate data, procurement access, and inclusive finance for SMEs

Transcript

Ian: I’m Ian O’Donnell, I’m deputy chair of policy at the Federation of Small Businesses and one of the non-executive directors there. And as an organisation, our role really is to support and help the small business community, both through a range of sort of support tools, including insurance and things like that. But also, crucially, and the key reason for our being is to talk to stakeholders at national and local level, in government and otherwise, about how they can make sure we have the right environment for the small business community for them to thrive.

Ross: Yeah. And I guess, yeah. So the small business community there, what kind of size are we looking at?

Ian: So we, we represent the SME business community. But the majority of our membership and the businesses we engage with are at the micro end of the small business community. So less than ten employees. Though we have a fair few members as well who are sort of in the 10 to 50 employees and a few who are bigger than that. But primarily we’re there to support sort of the smaller end of the SME community. And to really ensure that they get a voice when individually they wouldn’t have a voice. So obviously each of those individual small business owners don’t have the time or the resources in the way that a large business does to speak to government. So we very much act as a collective voice for that small business community.

Ross: Yeah. No. Really cool. I guess moving in into the net zero space then I guess there’s a, thinking about what you just said there, it’s like, do they have the education? Do they have the power to, you know, track their carbon emissions? You know what’s SMEs plans in that space?

Ian: Yeah. So the challenge here is two-fold. Obviously A. The rules coming down the line in terms of reporting of carbon footprint, carbon calculation. And particularly actually that’s already being felt through the procurement process. Obviously larger businesses have already got to report on scope three. And obviously that inevitably means if they have small businesses in their supply chain, those small businesses are being asked to report on their carbon footprint, even though actually legally as yet, they don’t have to report. And so the supply chain already means that this is coming into effect. And, the problem for many micro and small businesses is they don’t have the knowledge, they don’t have the skills, and they don’t have the access to resources to A. Monitor and measure their carbon footprint. And B. Sometimes don’t have the ability to put changes into practice in order to reduce their carbon footprint, if they’re in shared premises, if they’re in a tenanted building, rather than owning their building, short term leases quite often often means they don’t have the capacity to to make the changes that they want to, for example.

Ross: Yeah, definitely. Yeah, it’s a really good point the, it’s always quite clear when it’s like large corporations what they need to do to stay in line, but the small businesses actually make up the larger businesses supply chain.

Ian: Exactly. And also in terms of the economy as a whole. So it’s why it’s so important that we don’t and the government in particular, doesn’t leave the SME community out of this sort of race to net zero in terms of their support and enablement for that. You know, five over 5 million of businesses in the UK making up over 99% of the business community are SMEs, and over 2 million of those are less than ten employees. So this is a significant proportion of our business community here in the UK. So if we don’t solve the problem for those businesses, we are not going to solve the macro problem of how we get to a net zero carbon neutral economy.

Ross: Yeah. No. Very true. I was reading this SMEs make up around 50% of UK business emissions as well.

Ian: Yes, exactly.

Ross: I guess now it’s good. We’ve, we’ve kind of set the scene now to lead into Perseus. And just where do you see the value of Perseus for FSB and, and your, your SME customer base?

Ian: Yeah. So the real value of this, from our perspective, is if we can automate and simplify the process by which a micro or small business can get the data it needs to report on its carbon footprint, particularly in their scope one and scope two emissions from micro business, because they have less requirement to report on scope three, but certainly their scope one and scope two, they’re having to report up supply chains. It’d be invaluable.

There are challenges to it, and it’s great that you know what Project Perseus has also given that opportunity to discuss some of the challenges around how this happens, because what with many small businesses being in tenanted premises or even in shared premises, they often don’t have direct access to metering and details of their energy consumption. And so I know it’s been really good recently through Project Perseus, to have some of those discussions about how do we still enable those small businesses through other forms of technology, to be able to report in using the project Perseus mechanism, to then allow that data to be transferred.

Ross: Yeah. Yeah. That’s amazing. Really good. Really good to hear that you’re working through those challenges. And I guess you work through the challenges in a collaborative environment as well, so you can hear other people’s pain points.

Ian: Yeah. Exactly that. You know, it’s been great with Project Perseus that you’ve got, you know, a good range of people, from the financial institutions to the those involved in the metering through to representatives like myself, representing the business community. And sort of all looking at the problem in different ways, but all with an overall passion to say, how do we make it as easy as possible for the SME community to be able to get the data it needs to be able to report accurately?

Ross: Yeah. And how do you think, thinking more long term. How do you think Perseus could slot into you know, what you offer SMBs? Could it be part of your offerings, like education, teaching them on sustainability? Could Perseus that slot in there.

Ian: Yeah. So I think for us it’ll be about connecting people up. So you know what carbon calculators are out there. Accountancy packages, all the rest of it. How do we work with those to make sure they’re plugging in data when it’s available through Project Perseus and other things that may become available to simplify for SMEs that process of producing a carbon report.

We’re also involved in organisations like UKAS, which is the UK accreditation service, on how do we make sure that there is a common standard and universality about data reporting, because at the moment, as many, you know, and we’ve discussed again through Project Perseus, is actually you can go to several different tools and get several different answers on what your carbon footprint is. So how do we create some consistency and some certainty about the data, which is obviously vital when it comes to SMEs accessing. Two key things one procurement opportunities and second biggest issue affecting many SMEs – access to finance. And with banks obviously requiring to know what the carbon footprint is. And wanting some assurity of that data. Anything we can do to help create that is vital. But notwithstanding that challenge of making sure that all SMEs have access to the data. Which isn’t necessarily going to come through half hourly metering for all of those SME community.

Ross: What do you think the barriers might be for SMEs engaging with Perseus. We can help with this kind of work we’re doing right now. But how can we improve engagement?

Ian: The reality is SMEs themselves are probably not going to be engaging with Project Perseus directly. They’re going to be engaging with the partners who come on board, who provide that mechanism for that data, to then become available in the tools that SMEs are using. So when we look at accountancy packages; Xero, QuickBooks, Sage, etc. you know, it’s vital that they engage with Project Perseus because then that data flows naturally into those systems and they, you know, just the same way as I can do my balance sheet of my accounts, I can go on there and I can get my carbon report. If we connect all the dots well, through Project Perseus, that’s where SMEs are really going to see a benefit for those that have got access to that data in the current form. And also I think where Project Perseus, as it starts to see that success and that enablement, there’s increasing pressure to say, how do we solve the problem of businesses that don’t have access to half hourly metering? And, you know, I’m sure you know, as a collective we’ll be able to create pressure and, and also create some of the solutions to how that data can be sourced.

Ross: Yeah, definitely. And there’s also the fact that, you know, this is our first use case is electricity. And then it could move into to, a lot of people are saying gas, at the moment. But there’s loads of other ways to go.

Ian: Water is, you know, the three big ones for any micro business, small business is going to be electricity, water, gas. So if we can solve those, those big three and automate that, and then obviously we then move into many other areas in terms of travel and so on. But those are more in scope three. But if we look at scope two, those are the biggest. How can we make that simple and straightforward for the SME community?

Ross: Yeah. Really cool. Yes. I’ve spoken to Sage and I’ve spoken to a few others, but, I think FSB is interesting in the sense that you work with government and policy makers. I wanted to talk about what inkling you get from the government on, you know, on this topic and how important it is tracking SMEs emissions. How important is that for the government?

Ian: I think, you know, overall, this government has continued to be fairly positive on the discussion around how do we reach a low carbon economy. And so continue to have that as a focus, or at least there’s been some consistency for a while now around the importance of reducing carbon footprints for all businesses. Um, I think the challenge, as inevitably government understands big business a bit more readily than it understands small business. And I think the reduction in carbon and the way that a big business can adapt is very different from a small business. And I think one of our key roles has been to sort of have that constructive discussion with the government to sort of say, yeah, that that scheme, that program you’ve got over there works very well if you’re a big business. But actually small businesses are different. And how do you help them and support them in a slightly different way. So. And one of the key areas of that is around education. So it’s great that we’re through Project Perseus creating the tools. But we’ve also got to provide the education and support for that small business to be able to adapt and change and deliver on a carbon reduction plan within their business over the next few years.

And alongside that, also, we’re very much in discussion with government about, well, how do you facilitate that? So I know I keep going on about it, but the sort of the tenanted aspect, small businesses do not generally own their own premises – actually creates not just the challenge of access to data, but it also creates a big challenge in terms of the ability to affect change. If I own my premises and it’s a big premises, it’s no problem to stick solar panels on the roof. It’s no problem to switch over to air source heat pumps. If I don’t own my premises. I don’t necessarily have the access and the ability to make those changes. And also, if I’m perhaps only got a five year tenancy as opposed to a 25 year tenancy that a bigger business might have if it is a tenant, I don’t have the ability to finance that and get return on investment within that relatively short timescale. So how do we again looking to government for support and perhaps creating the frameworks whereby you can have transferable finance around, adaptations to buildings and things like that?

Ross: Yes. Is that a data problem or a legislative problem?

Ian: It’s partly a legislative problem. It’s partly just a you know, the finance industry is not used to the fact that who owns the the asset is quite challenging in that scenario. So if I as the business don’t own the building, but I’m the one who wants to put on the solar panels, but I might be moving out in five years, how does that journey look from a financing perspective? That’s not something that is a traditional financing model that they’re comfortable with. Especially as some of the technologies we’re talking about are emerging technologies. And so again, financiers are also slightly wary of that. So really we’re looking for business to step in and give some assurity to those who are providing finance, to be able to give confidence in the data about carbon reduction that these will provide. How, through Project Perseus, we can get accurate data about the impact it’s having for that business. And how do we solve the problem of, in effect, the landlord tenant split on these things.

Ross: Yeah, fantastic. And just thinking there on, this is again more geopolitical. But you’re talking about big businesses and banks there, and there’s this trend that seems to be coming from across the pond. HSBC, BP now changing its sustainability targets when you’ve got these big businesses changing their net zero plans. Do you think that’s going to have a knock on effect for SMEs, or is it more time to double down on SME emissions?

Ian: It’s really interesting sort of seeing the way different big businesses are responding. So, some are actually responding by saying no, we think this is the right thing to do. We are in, we actually want to locate in the UK because it’s a good place to be from a support and a framework around low carbon. But other businesses, obviously, as we’re seeing perhaps located elsewhere, are reducing their targets. And I think it does create a challenge for SMEs because any business wants certainty, any business wants to know the landscape into which it’s planning. When you’ve got a lack of certainty and moving targets, then it becomes very difficult to plan. Bearing in mind that a small business needs ROI on a much shorter timescale than a large business can afford to have when making investments such as carbon reduction, type investments will tend to be. So yeah, one of the things that’s really vital is that we we have a consistency of approach, and that deadlines and timelines don’t keep moving for SMEs, because otherwise I know from experience, from conversations that we’ve had in the community, is that if the timelines keep moving and keep getting pushed back, the response is, well, actually what I will do is not bother because it might never come anyway.

Ross: Yeah, definitely. And that’s really, really interesting. I don’t know if you wanted to add anything to discuss on Perseus itself or, or even anything coming up for FSB you think might be relevant?

Ian: No, I mean, I think the key things that I think we are affecting the small business community is simplicity and a assurity of data, so that if data is available, that we can know it’s good and that it’s simple and easy to report on. And that we give access to data for the whole small business community. So solving the problem around access to data, if you don’t have half hourly metering available in whatever building you do, bearing in mind, as I was talking to somebody just earlier, you know, working in a garden office in their home, you know, what does that look like from an energy reporting business for a small business, when it’s part of your overall household energy bill? And then making sure that we maintain access to procurement and access to finance for SMEs and don’t exclude them as carbon accounting and the sort of requirement for scope three emissions reporting becomes ever more prevalent. Let’s not exclude small businesses, but let’s use supply chains to help and enable them to make that transition effectively.

Summary:

• The draft Executive Summary was agreed and endorsed by members. 
• It was agreed that the 2025 aim is to ‘go to market’.
• It was noted that the 2025 target is to have 5 CAPs and 3 FSPs activated/live in the market.
• B4NZ provided a landscape update, including notes from COP:
  • It was noted that SME prominence in the global climate discussion continues to grow, becoming embedded in the COP infrastructure. 
  • It was noted there is a newly launched Willow Review – which aims to underline the financial benefits of sustainability for small businesses across the UK
  • It was noted that B4NZ received positive feedback on the Perseus updates given at COP
• It was noted that Perseus will pursue plans to host parliamentary drop-ins to provide updates to MPs on the programme and there was a call for support and involvement from SG members 

• It was noted that data is mentioned in the UK Industrial Strategy and the Data (Use and Access) Bill is making its way through Parliament. It was noted that Perseus is as an exemplar cross-sector Smart Data initiative in the UK
• The Delivery Oversight Committee (DoC) provided an update on progress. It was noted that funding has been challenging and remains top of the agenda to deliver the project. It was noted that joint funding by industry and government would help both provide continuity and ensure that both commercial, social and national needs are addressed.
• It was noted that the Development Bank of Wales (DBW) has used Perseus to underpin the issuance of a green loan. DBW gave a presentation on their experience with Perseus so far and noted that:
  • within the pilot they are aiming to develop their own capability to support innovation in SME transition finance, and support the broader market to deliver 
  • Perseus aligns with their objective to ensure that SMEs have the knowledge, skills and finance to support a just transition 
  • the first candidate for Perseus has been identified with a loan expected to be sanctioned after Christmas 
  • Pilot findings included:
    • The importance of getting early buy-in from leadership, investment and legal teams 
    • that Perseus is suitable to work within existing due diligence controls and customer relationships 
    • it has been demonstrated that where a customer is willing to give permission to their data being used, DBW are willing to use it in their loan decision, with the loan being linked to measure performance 

• The question ‘What’s the most exciting thing we can do in 2025?’ was discussed and focussed on increasing both the number and size of loans issued to accelerate impact across multiple lenders
• Advisory Groups presented and noted:
  • AG1 has a document detailing product opportunities for FSPs, CAPs and government, ecosystem maps and future innovation cases, and has endorsed the Assurability Framework 
  • AG2 has a goal to deliver end-end infrastructure during the pilot phase, with the pilot directory and registry already operational in 2024
  • AG3 has drafted the Perseus Scheme agreement and Dispute Resolution Procedure
  • In 2025 the policy and regulatory group (AG5) will be reinstigated (it had been merged with AG3 in 2024)
  • AG4 will lead communications on the report and messaging will focus on increasing engagement and trust in the project
• It was agreed that support will be sought from SG members to support communications in the go to market phase in 2025, to assist in building trust with all stakeholders. It was noted that such communications would be most effective if synchronised. It was discussed that London Climate Action Week could be such an opportunity.

Co-chairs:

• Tony Greenham, British Business Bank
• Gavin Starks, Icebreaker One 

Principal:

• Heather Buchanan, Bankers for Net Zero

Secretariat:

• Icebreaker One

The next meeting will take place on the 26th February 2025.

Formal records are maintained by the secretariat. These are confidential to the Steering Group Members.

Perseus is developing whole-of-market solutions to create rapidly scalable, low-effort, low-friction sustainability reporting for SMEs. The ultimate objective is to arrive at a standardised approach that is fit for purpose for, and can be rapidly deployed across the market. The Perseus Advisory Groups will inform the development of an environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data ecosystem which accelerates the transition to net zero.

Key insights from the User Needs & Impact Advisory Group

• Focussing on developing the infrastructure and a demonstrator will show the value and impact of Perseus to key stakeholders
• We discussed the importance of scope and focus – doing one thing well (automating electricity data) allows for that value to be demonstrated
• It is vital to be separating what we should focus on for the demonstrator, and what can be placed on a roadmap
• Key to understand what is useful and impactful for each stakeholder – such as linking kilowatt hour and spend data – as that is the language SMEs speak
• Challenges related to data access, format, and engagement were discussed, including the need for transparency and trustworthy certifications

Key insights from the Communications Advisory Group

• We agreed on the scope and core communication goals, and identified key stakeholders we need to be properly engaging
• It is important to have a low barrier to entry to engage with SMEs
• The value messaging needs to reflect what is relevant to them, with tangible benefits specific to what is in it for them to participate

The Advisory Groups play a critical role in Perseus’ development. There is more information on the other Advisory Groups and their meeting dates here. If you want to get in touch with us, email us at perseus@ib1.org.  

Why automate SME emissions reporting?

Elisa Moscolin, EVP Sustainability & Foundation at Sage highlighted the importance of simplifying reporting processes for SMEs, enabling them to actively participate in the transition to a low-carbon economy: “SMEs want to get engaged, they want to get on board, but they find it incredibly difficult. They find the regulatory framework and reporting requirements impossible to navigate.”  As to the potential impact on emissions reduction, Elisa explained that ‘44% of greenhouse gas emissions, non household GHG emissions. The bottom line is, we will not achieve Net Zero without them.’

Now is the time to act – join Perseus

A motto we repeat often is ‘to go far, we must go together’. Nowhere is that more apparent than in a complex multi-stakeholder project like Perseus. With the founding team in place, we are looking to expand our coalition to build a truly whole-of-market solution addressing the needs and interests of all stakeholders.

Remaining on the sidelines increasingly represents a reputational and strategic risk for any business with Net Zero ambitions. With DESNZ on the steering group, ministerial support from the ministers for Energy Security and Net Zero, and the project leads feeding into the new Net Zero Council and Smart Data Council, we are confident that the project’s outputs will influence future policy and regulation. By joining Perseus, organisations can contribute to shaping this future.

During the launch event, Alex Sobel, MP and shadow minister for Nature Recovery and the Domestic Environment, emphasised the need for stakeholders to come together and support Project Perseus. He urged organisations not yet involved to seize the opportunity, stating, “If you’re not an early adopter, you’ll get left behind, and this wave is coming.” 

Louis Taylor, CEO of the British Business Bank, echoed this, stating “You just have to think about the opportunity to be involved in shaping the future.”

Conclusion:

As we reflect on the success of the launch event and the shared vision of industry leaders, it is evident that Project Perseus is positioned to become a key piece of national infrastructure underpinning the Net Zero transition. By simplifying reporting for SMEs and fostering collaboration among stakeholders, we are paving the way for a sustainable future. Stay tuned for further updates and join us as we empower SMEs to embark on their net-zero journey. Together, we can make a significant impact and build a resilient, low-carbon economy.

To join the programme, sign up here or contact perseus@ib1.org for more information.

For the UK to hit its national targets we must both re-risk investment and make impact accountable. This will require opening up access to commercial data using low-friction, secure, trusted networks. In addition, data that is in the national interest must be published for access by anyone using open licenses. 

Examples of open standards for data sharing include Open Banking, Open Energy and insurance and asset-level innovation such as SERI.

Open standards can help create open marketplaces for commercial and open data: rapidly expanding proven sector trust frameworks to support the finance sector to find, access and use data; to create incentives, improve decision making and radically increase transparency. 

Imagine a decision-maker could mandate net-zero,
continuously measure progress and
act to adapt incentives in a timely, credible manner.

Our aim at IB1 is to make data work harder to deliver Net Zero—to unlock data flows for better metrics, risk assessment and incentive creation, to model Net Zero strategies and returns, unlock high-resolution economic analysis, and enable the practical application of real-world data down to the asset level. The opportunity is to deliver an open marketplace for commercial data that incentivises the whole value chain. This can be achieved through the implementation of open standards for data sharing.

To deliver a demonstrably Net Zero future requires changes to institutional frameworks of data sharing and access (governance, regulation, transparency). For example, a regulatory mandate not only ‘to’ disclose but ‘how to’ disclose. A trust framework can inform mandates for policy and regulation, legal, operational and technical standards for interoperability. This is a systems-based approach in which financial, engineering, consumption and environmental data can be activated and operationalised.

The approach can enable:

• Operational open marketplaces for commercial data sharing across sectors
• Distributed, decentralised activity with a minimum-viable centralised service 
• Delivery of co-developed, policy-aligned solutions that address market needs
• Cohesion and interoperability, radically reducing cost and friction
• Risk-managed and cost-effective solutions for governance and compliance 
• Industry innovation to support, de-risk and incentivise Net Zero

Icebreaker One has, in collaboration with government, regulators and industry, created a market-wide solution for secure commercial data sharing and is implementing this across energy, transport, water, agriculture and the built world. This is based on a proven blueprint: with Treasury backing, Open Banking opened up secure access to shared financial data. It has since transformed the fintech sector, creating tens of billions of pounds in value. This is expanding to Open Finance and is, also with government support, being developed for Open Energy.