Science-Based Targets Explained: What “Aligned with 1.5°C” Actually Means for Your Business

“Our target is aligned with 1.5 degrees” has become one of the most common phrases in corporate climate strategy, and one of the most frequently used without much precision about what it actually requires. A science-based target is not simply an ambitious-sounding number an organisation sets for itself. It is a specific, externally validated commitment, assessed against defined methodologies by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), the global body that reviews whether a company’s proposed emissions reduction pathway is genuinely consistent with what climate science says is needed.

What makes a target “science-based”

A target earns the label “science-based” only once it has been assessed against the SBTi’s methodology and formally validated, not simply because an organisation describes its own ambition that way. The core requirements, under the current Corporate Net-Zero Standard, include:

Absolute emissions reduction, not just intensity improvement. Targets are generally required to reduce absolute emissions (total tonnes of CO2 equivalent), not just emissions intensity per unit of revenue or output, since intensity improvements can mask rising absolute emissions in a growing business.

Coverage of material Scope 3 emissions, not just Scope 1 and 2. Where Scope 3 represents a significant share of an organisation’s total footprint, which it does for the large majority of businesses, science-based targets require Scope 3 categories to be included in the target boundary, not left out because they are harder to measure or influence.

Near-term and long-term targets, working together. A credible science-based commitment sets a near-term target, typically covering a five to ten year horizon, alongside a long-term net-zero target for a future date such as 2050, so that progress can actually be tracked along the way rather than assessed only against a distant end point decades from now.

A defined pathway to net zero, not just an offsetting plan. Reaching net zero under the SBTi framework means reducing absolute emissions by a very substantial margin, generally in the order of 90 percent or more from baseline, before any residual emissions are addressed through permanent carbon removal, not through conventional offsetting used as a substitute for reduction.

Why “aligned with 1.5°C” is a specific, checkable claim

The 1.5 degree reference is not a slogan. It ties directly to the remaining global carbon budget consistent with limiting warming to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels under the Paris Agreement, and the SBTi’s methodology translates that global budget into sector-specific reduction pathways, sometimes called sectoral decarbonisation approaches, that different industries are expected to follow given their different starting points and technological pathways to decarbonisation. This is precisely why a validated science-based target is meaningfully different from an internally set ambition described in similar language: the validated version has actually been checked against a defined, published methodology, not just asserted.

What is changing, and what to do now

The SBTi published a major update to its framework, the Corporate Net-Zero Standard Version 2.0, in mid-2026, restructuring target setting around continuous, cyclical validation with stronger requirements around published transition plans and ongoing progress assessment, rather than a one-time certification an organisation could set and effectively file away. Validation against the new version is not expected to open until early 2027. In the meantime, the current Corporate Net-Zero Standard (Version 1.3.1) remains a credible, actively used framework, and organisations planning to set or renew targets now are generally advised to do so under the current standard, since flexibilities available under Version 1.3.1 will remain accessible even as the newer standard’s innovations become available over time. In other words, waiting for the new version before setting a first target is not necessary, and for most organisations, not advisable.

Why this matters even if you never seek formal validation

Not every organisation needs, or can justify the resourcing for, formal SBTi validation. But understanding the framework’s actual requirements, absolute reduction, material Scope 3 coverage, a genuine near-term and long-term pathway, and offsetting reserved only for a small residual, is valuable regardless, because it is increasingly the yardstick investors, large customers, and regulators use to judge whether any net zero claim, validated or not, is actually credible.