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What is the ESG Data Convergence Project?

Founded in 2021, ILPA’s ESG Data Convergence Project is a groundbreaking private markets initiative endeavoring to standardize ESG reporting across private equity and venture capital firms, as a tool for comparative benchmarking, investor data sharing, and sustained industry improvement. Despite rising pressure from LPs in recent years, GPs have been limited to servicing ESG needs by completing manually intensive, bespoke LP data requests or reporting into disparate ESG frameworks constructed primarily for larger, diversified financial institutions (e.g., SASB, GRI).

For its inaugural 2021 reporting year, the ESG Data Convergence Project has outlined a starting set of six ESG categories to make reporting manageable and drive uptake in advance of their April 30th, 2022 submission deadline. These core metrics, alongside additional firmographic detail, will be requested of each portfolio company at participating GPs, as follows:

Over 120 GPs have already committed to reporting portfolio ESG performance across these categories, and we at Green Project anticipate that this initiative will continue to grow into the foremost private investment framework.

How can Green Project help?

Green Project’s SaaS-based ESG platform cuts through the cost and complexity of collecting, processing, and reporting ESG data. For investment managers, we make it simple to understand and disclose on ESG performance by bringing accessible, affordable tools to their portfolio companies that may lack the time and dedicated sustainability teams to manage ESG in-house. By automating data collection via secure integrations with portfolio companies’ existing data systems (e.g., utility providers, financial accounting software), housing an integrated data hub for Social and Governance, and providing streamlined onboarding and intuitive dashboard analytics, Green Project meets portfolio companies where they are in their ESG journeys. For their investors, Green Project’s portfolio management tools, aggregated insights, and instantly downloadable reports can simplify ESG engagement and improvement.

Green Project has been staying up-to-date with Project leadership to ensure fully compliant methodology and coverage, and is currently supporting several committed private equity & venture capital firms in need of ESG reporting assistance. 

For additional detail on the ESG Data Convergence Project, please review ILPA’s Project Overview, and if Green Project's ESG management solutions make sense for your business, please reach out to our team.