A new tool for measuring the effectiveness of net zero pledges of 4,000 countries, regions, cities, and companies across the globe was launched today.

Thomas Hale, Associate Professor of Public Policy at the School and part of the team that created the Net Zero Tracker, said: "Remarkably, net zero has now gone fully mainstream, but not all net zero pledges are created equal. As targets and pledges proliferate, this tracker will shine a light on which ones are genuinely ambitious, comprehensive, transparent and accountable.

It’s going to give entities setting net zero targets the ability to benchmark themselves against science and against their peers. And it’s going to give the stakeholders of those entities—their citizens, their consumers, their investors, their business partners, and their critics—a tool to push for more action.

The tracker is a major step forward for radical transparency, but clear standards are also vital to ensure that net zero targets are delivered."

The Net Zero Tracker a global initiative led by the Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit, Data-Driven EnviroLab, NewClimate Institute and Oxford Net Zero, of which Thomas Hale is one of the principal investigators.

The Net Zero Tracker builds on the ‘Taking Stock’ report published in March 2021 by ECIU and Oxford Net Zero, of which Thomas Hale is co-author; and the ‘Navigating the Nuances of Net Zero’ report by the NewClimate Institute and Data-Driven EnviroLab - the first quantitative and qualitative analyses of global net zero commitments.

The tracker relies on a combination of machine learning and a global team of trained volunteers to keep tabs in real-time on both the quantity and, importantly, quality of net zero targets. It will eventually include more entities, and comes with a new website allowing users to freely access, download and analyse data.