A claim is the beginning of a trail
Take a draft statement such as “our energy use fell”. The supporting record should identify which operations are covered, the two periods being compared, the unit, the calculation and any changes in coverage. Without those details, the same sentence can describe very different situations.
Link the published statement to a calculation record and that calculation to the original inputs. Record who prepared and reviewed it. Another colleague should be able to reproduce the result without asking the original author to remember what happened.
Illustrative example: a percentage reduction
Suppose a fictional site uses 120 MWh in the first period and 108 MWh in the second. The absolute decrease is 12 MWh, or 10% of the first period. Those are illustrative figures, not performance results from GRI or any real organization.
Now suppose the site also reduced production from 1,000 units to 800. Energy intensity changes from 0.120 to 0.135 MWh per unit: an increase of 12.5%. Both calculations can be correct. The interpretation depends on the question, activity measure and consistent coverage. Publish the denominator alongside an intensity number.
Give gaps a status
- Measured: identify the instrument or underlying record and its coverage.
- Estimated: preserve the estimation method, assumptions and reason measurement is unavailable.
- Pending: name the missing input, its owner and the next review date.
- Not applicable: explain the factual basis; do not use this label as a substitute for missing data.
These are practical project statuses. They are not a substitute for the specific reasons for omission permitted by a reporting standard.
Review the joins, not just the totals
Check whether tables, charts and narrative use the same period and scope. Look for a unit that changes halfway through a spreadsheet, a location counted twice or a restated base year that did not reach the chart. Keep a record of corrections and their effect on the published result.
Use the data-quality workbench to explore the arithmetic. For a complete report, retain the actual inputs and the applicable methodology separately.