18 Pension Protection Fund Climate Change Report 2022/23 STRATEGY AND RISK MANAGEMENT CONTINUED CASE STUDY eFront ESG Outreach project We have been closely involved in an ESG outreach project led by one of our data solution providers eFront (part of BlackRock) to address the lack of ESG and climate-related data and reporting from private companies. We joined the eFront ESG Outreach pilot project as In terms of emissions data reported for the PPF a limited partner (LP) in late-2021, working with a funds in the pilot: selection of private equity and credit general partners (GPs) managing funds with vintage years from 2015 to • 37 per cent of our portfolio companies reported collect relevant ESG and climate metrics on underlying GHG emissions data, of which just over half was portfolio companies. actual rather than estimated data We anticipate this initiative will go a long way to • The frequency of Scope 1 and 2 emissions disclosure improving the process for private market data collection, was much higher than Scope 3; only 25 per cent especially among smaller managers that haven’t yet built of companies reported on Scope 3 whether actual out their own reporting functionality. The ultimate aim or estimated (similar to public markets) is to open the product up to over 2,500 private market • eFront was also able to o昀昀er LPs the option to 昀椀ll managers, reaching over 70,000 private companies. some data gaps with higher-level sector estimates; With our encouragement, 60 per cent of our own as a result, emissions data (whether actual or managers that were contacted in the pilot phase reported estimated) was available for just over 90 per portfolio company data – four times higher than the cent of our portfolio companies in the funds that overall response rate. responded to the pilot. Next steps The 2023 update has been signi昀椀cantly expanded across the eFront platform and increased eightfold for PPF’s GPs. As part of the broader roll-out this year, it has been recognised that more education is needed among GPs to raise awareness of the regulation that LPs face in di昀昀erent jurisdictions and the timeframes for reporting.