Quantify the positive and negative impacts

of your organization and investments

Reveal the societal and environmental footprint of your organization and your investments with our science-based, standardized, and data-driven approach – and benchmark the performance of your investments against industry averages and peers with clarity and credibility.

impacts investors

PI’s Impact Accounting Framework 

Measure positive and negative impacts

Current and future impacts

Understand total current and future impacts

Use cases

For asset owners & LP’s:

  • Asset allocation
  • GP selection
  • Portfolio construction & re-balancing
  • Monitoring and reporting

For asset managers & GP’s:

  • Fund design and creation
  • Portfolio management
  • Reporting and stakeholder communication
  • Divestment decisions

What sets us apart

Our science-based, impact-washing-free Impact Accounting Framework helps you identify both positive and negative impacts. It directs attention to what’s truly material — so you avoid underestimating risks, overestimating opportunities, or wasting resources on what doesn’t matter.

Materiality

How to use quantified indicators to measure impact materiality

our tools empower investors to

Identify financial effects, risks and opportunities
tied to the material impacts of your investments
Measure current impacts on
Topics covered by PI's Impact Accounting Framework
FORECAST future impacts 
based on strategies, trends, and set targets of your investments
benchmark
your portfolio or funds against industry average and peers
cross-sectoral
applicable across all industries and value chains
ACT with confidence
based on data and clear accounting rules – not assumptions

Impacts are no longer abstract – they’re measurable

Regulations are evolving, stakeholders are watching, and climate urgency is real. Knowing your impacts isn’t just smart — it’s essential. Yet most tools stop at vague, qualitative insights that don’t drive decisions. Our Impacts Accounting Framework and Tool changes that without impact washing the results.

Independent of sector-focus or size, you gain a clear and comparable picture of where your investments stand, what’s required, and the path to creating positive impacts — turning impact data into real strategic action.

PI's Impact Accounting Framework for Investments

Measuring the positive and negative impacts of your investments

Built on internationally recognized science and methodologies, the Science-based Targets Path® (SbTP) enables you to quantify both positive and negative impacts of every investments — not just in theory, but in actionable, measurable terms. It covers the issues that matter most: climate, water, biodiversity, health, social matters, and net tax.

The Science-based Targets Path®…

  • The dotted line represents the science-based trajectory needed to meet global sustainability targets. An investment’s performance above the path delivers positive impacts, while performance below it results in negative impacts
  • Starting from today’s net global societal costs (a deficit), the path shows how we can move toward net societal benefits by 2050
  • Any investment can be mapped onto this curve — to see where it stands today, where it’s heading, and how to align with science-based targets across climate, people, and the economy

What's the added value?

The Science-based Targets Path® provides:

> A science-based target value for six topics and 14 indicators

> A clear trajectory from 2020 to 2050 (and beyond)

> Full value-chain coverage — from operations to upstream and downstream impacts

> Benchmark the performance of your investments against peers and industry averages — to see exactly where you stand and where to improve

> CSRD alignment — enabling fact-based, auditable, and legally sound materiality assessments across short-, mid-, and long-term horizons

Topics and indicators of PI's Impact Accounting Framework

The topics included:

  • Climate
  • Water
  • Biodiversity (nature)
  • Health
  • Social matters
  • net Tax payments
In turn, each topic has its own set of indicators (see slider right)

Indicators

PI’s Science-based Targets Path® (SbTP) for climate allows you to clearly measure positive and negative climate impacts and account for them.
PI’s Science-based Targets Path® (SbTP) for water allows you to clearly measure positive and negative water impacts and account for them.
PI’s Science-based Targets Path® (SbTP) for biodiversity (nature) allows you to clearly measure positive and negative biodiversity impacts and account for them.
PI’s Science-based Targets Path® (SbTP) for health allows you to clearly measure positive and negative health impacts and account for them.
PI’s Science-based Targets Path® (SbTP) for social matters allows you to clearly measure positive and negative social impacts and account for them.
PI’s Science-based Targets Path® (SbTP) for tax (net) allows you to clearly measure positive and negative tax impacts and account for them.

PI's Science-based Targets Path basis

PI’s Science-based Targets Path® incorporates targets and data from authoritative sources such as IPCC, UNEP, Stockholm Resilience Centre, UN Sustainable Development Goals, ILO, IMF and OECD

Why use the path? The standardization is what makes our tool powerful: it translates global sustainability goals into concrete thresholds for individual organizations, so you can track where you are today, forecast your future, and take action with confidence.

Current and Future Impacts of your Investments

Our tool assesses both current and future impacts of your investments — across climate, water, biodiversity, health, social matters, and tax.

> Current impacts show the actual effects of your investments in recent years
> Future impacts project the performance of your investments based on trends, targets, and planned actions of you and your investments

All impacts are first quantified — in absolute values, percentages, or monetary terms (€/$) — and then translated into clear performance levels. This makes complex impact data understandable, actionable, and easy to benchmark.

PI's 4 Investment Impacts KPIs

CURRENT IMPACTS of your investments in %

Current Impacts show how your investments are performing today compared to the expected level for the current year.

They:

> Express performance as a percentage (−X% to +X%), with 0% = full alignment to the PI Science-based Targets Path®

> Apply impact weighting, so more severe outcomes (e.g. a fatality vs. an injury) carry greater influence

> Translate results into a star rating (★): 3★ = full alignment (0% deviation), 5★ = ≥100% positive deviation

> Highlight strengths and gaps, making it easier to focus on what matters most

> Provide topic-level scores and an overall weighted average, summarizing overall impacts across six topics: climate, water, biodiversity, health, social matters, and net tax

> Cover any economic activity, enabling benchmarking across sectors

After quantifying Current Impacts, an organization’s sustainability performance is classified into three Impact Ambitions — high, medium, or low.

These ambition levels reveal how your performance compares to PI’s Science-based Targets Path® or to the global average, making it easy to see whether you are leading, aligned, or falling behind.

The CURRENT Impacts in % divide the current performance of your investments by the expected SbTP one to derive the % alignment with the SbTP

CURRENT IMPACTS of your investments in monetary terms (€/$ per K€)

This KPI quantifies your organization’s net positive and negative impacts in money terms — the external costs or benefits your activities create for society.

It:

> Uses an open-ended scale, with 0 = full alignment to the PI Science-based Targets Path®

> Translates impacts into monetary units (€, $), reflecting externalities such as climate damage, water use, or social harm/benefits

> Aggregates results across all six topics — climate, water, nature, health, social, and net tax

> Provides both overall and topic-level results, weighted by impact severity

> Works for any business activity, enabling comparisons across sectors and value chains

This KPI complements Current Impacts (%), giving you one comprehensive, transparent measure of your current sustainability footprint. A positive value means you are performing above SbTP expectations; a negative value means you are falling short.

The CURRENT Impacts of the DAX 40 show overall negative impacts of -44 €/K€ revenue (-41%), covering operations + upstream for all indicators of the six topics while estimating missing data to ensure a complete picture

FUTURE IMPACTS (NPI®) of your investments in %

The Net Present Impact® (NPI®) in % is a forward-looking metric that projects your organization’s future impacts, weighted by time. Like Net Present Value (NPV), it gives more weight to near-term actions than to distant promises without ambitious milestones.

It:

> Calculates discounted projected performance relative to the expected path set by PI’s Science-based Targets Path®

> Expresses results as a percentage (−X% to +X%), with 0% = full alignment

> Enables comparison across companies, investments, and products in any industry

> Supports target management — benchmarking goals against peers, spotting gaps, and setting Impact Ambitions (High, Medium, Low)

The NPI® in % is especially powerful for external communication — providing stakeholders with a credible, comparable view of your expected future impacts.

FUTURE IMPACTS (NPI®) of your investments in $ or € and per K revenue

The Net Present Impact® (NPI®) in €/$ is a forward-looking monetary metric that projects your organization’s future net impacts, discounted to today — similar to Net Present Value (NPV). Like NPV, it gives greater weight to near-term actions than to distant targets without concrete milestones.

It:

> Discounts future impacts (e.g. 2025–2050) to present values in € or $

> Summarizes results in one monetary figure: positive = above the Path, negative = below, with 0 = full alignment to the PI Science-based Targets Path®

> Uses an open-ended scale, with no cap on positive or negative impacts

> Enables comparison across companies, sectors, products, or investments

> Supports target-setting and benchmarking, helping to spot gaps, assess alignment, and define Impact Ambitions (High, Medium, Low)

This KPI is particularly useful for sustainability planning and investment decisions. It translates long-term impacts into financial terms, making the scale and significance of alignment with the Science-based Targets Path® clear for financial stakeholders.

Investment Impact ambition levels

Once Current and Future Impacts of your Investments are quantified, results are classified into three Investment Impact Ambition Levels — High, Medium, or Low.

This allows you to measure, compare, and align your investment activities with the ambition level you aim for, providing a clear benchmark for strategy and performance.

Three Possible Investment Impact Ambition Levels: High Investment Impact Ambition (the impacts of your investments are net positive, their performance exceeds PI’s Science-based Targets Path®), Medium Investment Impact Ambition (the impacts of your investments are net negative, but their performance is better than the global average/business-as-usual) and Low Investment Impact Ambition (the impacts of your investments are net negative, their performance is below the global average/business-as-usual, but they are not the performance laggard of the respective industry); Existing Variations for No Investment Impact Ambition: Impact-/Greenwashing (allegedly “positive” impacts) and No Ambition (not known or don’t care)

use cases

Investors/Financial Market Participants

To evaluate the current and forecasted Impacts-Level of your funds, assets, or project portfolio, as well as identifying risks and opportunities, identifying areas for improvement, and track progress

Asset Owners/LPs

Intention: Incorporate ESG Impacts factors and sustainability goals into the long-term strategy

Challenge: Difficulty in quantifying sustainability Impacts (performance) and related long-term ESG risks and opportunities

Solution: Utilize PI’s Desired Impacts-Levels and Ambition Level Concept to determine overall investment strategies and conduct an Impacts-Level Forecast or a Strategy Stress test (external)/Due Diligence to assess sustainability Impacts, risks & opportunities, and strategy/governance gaps

Intention: Evaluate external asset managers’ strategic ESG integration capabilities
Challenge: Assessing managers’ sustainability understanding; distinguishing between asset managers who strategically manage the topic and those that don’t.

Intention: Continuously improve sustainability/ESG performance and integration, and maintain alignment with asset managers
Challenges:
> Lack of clarity on stewardship expectations
> Overemphasis on short-term performance
> Not taking enough account of stewardship outcomes which risk undermining longer-term sustainable growth

Solutions:
> Strategic engagement: Determine appropriate sustainability strategies for each investee to enhance their sustainability efforts and engage with them to ensure that they pursue them and use the PI KPIs to track and report your investor Impacts, using Strategy Stress test (external)/Due Diligence

> Integrated sustainability targets: Assess the level of alignment/ambition of sustainability targets set by portfolio companies to set targets for your portfolio, using Desired Impacts-Levels

Intention: Integrate sustainability/ESG Impacts & governance criteria alongside financial analysis
Challenge: Balancing sustainability/ESG priorities with financial performance expectations
Solutions:
> Investment strategy alignment check: Identify and assess potential investments for alignment with the overall sustainability goals of your organization using the Desired Impacts-Levels

> Integrated valuation & pricing: Quantify societal impacts of investments using Net Present Impact® to adjust valuations based on sustainability risks and opportunities by integrating sustainability-driven risks and opportunities into your valuations (NPV, Sharpe-ratio, etc.), using the Integrated ESGF Risk & Opportunity Assessment and Valuation

> Integrated decision-making: Inform investment decisions and portfolio rebalancing based on Desired Impacts-Levels and financial KPIs in the PI® Strategy Matrix

Intention: Track sustainability/ESG Impacts-Levels, guide and ensure a strategic sustainability management alongside monitoring financial indicators
Challenge: Lack of standardized sustainability/ESG data and metrics, as well as a lack of strategic sustainability management guides for consistent monitoring
Solutions:
> Identify & close data gaps for your portfolio on the KPIs of PI’s Science-based Targets Path® using PI’s Advanced Data Modeling

> Sustainability Impacts-Level Forecast for portfolio industries:

> Evaluate portfolio industries’ current and forecasted Impacts-Levels based on trends of your portfolio and obtain a general understanding how much the portfolio companies are ‘on track’ compared to science-based targets (i.e., the PI’s Science-based Targets Path®)

> Identify assets to be assessed further in a detailed sustainability Impacts-Forecast

> Detailed sustainability Impacts-Level Forecasts for individual assets:

> Evaluate the forecasted Impacts-Levels of selected portfolio companies/assets based on existing plans, targets, and trends and understand how much selected portfolio companies are ‘on track’ compared to science-based targets (i.e., the PI’s Science-based Targets Path®)

> Identify potential risks and opportunities and determine investment strategies using the PI® Strategy Matrix

> Impacts Benchmark: Compare investees’ performance across sectors and against peers to identify investment opportunities and engagement strategies

> Sustainability activity monitoring: Track progress on Impacts-Levels across your entire portfolio in the PI® Strategy Matrix

Intention: Include sustainability/ESG metrics in performance reporting

Challenge: Complexity of sustainability/ESG regulations and reporting requirements

Solution: Utilize PI’s sustainability-context-based KPIs, namely Impacts-Levels for the past fiscal year as well as Net Present Impact® and Net Present Target® for standardized reporting across the portfolio

Intention: Continuously improve sustainability/ESG performance and integration, and maintain alignment with asset managers
Challenges:
> Lack of clarity on stewardship expectations
> Overemphasis on short-term performance
> Not taking enough account of stewardship outcomes which risk undermining longer-term sustainable growth

Solutions:
> Strategic engagement: Determine appropriate sustainability strategies for each investee to enhance their sustainability efforts and engage with them to ensure that they pursue them and use the PI KPIs to track and report your investor Impacts, using Strategy Stress test (external)/Due Diligence

> Integrated sustainability targets: Assess the level of alignment/ambition of sustainability targets set by portfolio companies to set targets for your portfolio, using Desired Impacts-Levels

Asset Managers/GPs

Intention: Design fund structures incorporating sustainability/ESG criteria
Challenge: Defining clear, measurable sustainability criteria for fund creation (focusing on risks, opportunities, or meeting sustainability goals)
Solutions:
> Utilize PI Ambition Level Concept to determine overall investment strategies

> Set fund-level sustainability objectives based on PI’s Science-based Targets Path®

Intention: Apply sustainability/ESG integration in investment decision-making
Challenge: Ensuring sustainability/ESG integration throughout the full investment lifecycle while existing ESG data is mostly incomplete and full of missing information
Solutions:
> Identify and close data gaps for your portfolio on the KPIs of PI’s Science-based Targets Path® using PI’s AI-supported Data Modeling

> Conduct Strategy Stress test (external)/Due Diligence by identifying and assessing potential investments for alignment with the overall sustainability goals of the asset owner(s) or the fund(s), evaluating the target’s impacts, associated risks & opportunities, and gaps in its sustainability strategy

> Evaluate the current sustainability performance of potential investments by using Impacts-Level metrics

> Conduct a forward-looking Impacts Forecast for the investment lifecycle, calculating their Net Present Target® (NPT®) and Net Present Impact® (NPI®)

> Integrate valuation & pricing by using the quantified societal impacts of investments to justify premium pricing and adjust valuations based on sustainability risks and opportunities, using the Integrated ESGF Risk & Opportunity Assessment and Valuation for integrating sustainability-driven risks and opportunities into your valuations (NPV, Sharpe-ratio, etc.)

Intention: Actively monitor and manage sustainability/ESG impacts, risks, and opportunities (i.e., ongoing sustainability/ESG data management)
Challenge: Accessing reliable and up-to-date sustainability/ESG impacts data of your portfolio
Solutions:
In case your existing portfolio needs to be assessed:

> High-level Impacts-Level Forecast for portfolio industries:

> Evaluate portfolio industries’ current and forecasted Impacts-Levels based on trends of your portfolio and understand how much they are ‘on track’ compared to science-based targets (i.e., the PI’s Science-based Targets Path®) and industry averages, by using the Impacts-Level (%) for the current and the Net Present Target® (NPT®) for the projected Impacts Levels in % and the Impacts-Levels ($/€) for the current and the Net Present Impact® (NPI®) for the projected Impacts Levels in $ or €

> Identify potential risks and opportunities and industries to be assessed further in the PI® Strategy Matrix

> Detailed Impacts-Level Forecast for individual assets:

> Update the forecasted Impacts-Levels of selected portfolio companies based on existing plans, targets, and trends and understand how much selected portfolio companies are ‘on track’ compared to science-based targets (i.e. the PI’s Science-based Targets Path®), by updating the Impacts-Level (%) for the current and the Net Present Target® (NPT®) for the projected Impacts Levels in % and the Impacts-Level ($/€) for the current and the Net Present Impact® (NPI®) for the projected Impacts-Levels in $ or €

> Identify or validate risks and opportunities and determine investment and engagement strategies in the PI® Strategy Matrix

> Perform Impacts-Level Benchmarks to compare investees’ performance across sectors and against peers (to identify investment opportunities and engagement strategies)

In case your existing portfolio was already assessed:

> Implement engagement strategies with investees based on their Impacts-Levels, using the Strategy Stress test (external)/Due Diligence

> Set integrated sustainability targets for the portfolio, i.e., a target NPT® informed by the NPTs of the individual portfolio companies

> Continuously update fund strategies using impacts, risk, opportunity and ambition to align with evolving sustainability standards while maintaining financial performance

> Implement integrated decision-making processes at the asset level by informing investment decisions and rebalancing the asset’s product/service portfolio based on both sustainability Impacts-Levels and financial KPIs in the PI® Strategy Matrix

> Monitoring: Track progress by comparing the expected Impacts-Levels to the achieved performance across your entire portfolio in the PI® Strategy Matrix while keeping track of the activities and actions initiated by you (in case you want to monitor and report your investor impacts)

Intention: Report on sustainability outcomes to investors
Challenge: Meeting diverse investor expectations for sustainability/ESG reporting
Solutions:
> Utilize PI’s sustainability-context-based KPIs for standardized reporting across the portfolio by leveraging Impacts-Levels for clear communication of the current sustainability Impacts-Level of your portfolio

> Use NPT® and NPI® to demonstrate forward-looking sustainability strategies and alignment with science-based targets, meeting diverse investor reporting needs

Intention: Continuously improve ESG impacts and strategy of individual investees
Challenge: Balancing investees’ financial performance with ESG-driven priorities
Solution:
> Engage with portfolio companies using your insights into Impacts-Levels and gaps to a strategic sustainability management that fits

Intention: Consider sustainability/ESG factors in exit strategies for individual assets or an overall fund
Challenge: Deciding the right time for a divestment. Quantifying the change in Impacts during the holding period and if desired the investor’s share of it as well as the forecasted Impacts (NPI®)
Solutions:
> Inform divestment decisions and portfolio rebalancing based on Impacts and financial KPIs in the PI® Strategy Matrix

> Conducting final Strategy Stress test (external)/Due Diligence to assess improvements during the holding period by calculating the change in Impacts

> Using NPI® in exit valuations, demonstrating tangible current and forecasted Impacts to potential buyers and leveraging the Integrated Value & & assessment and valuation approach to justify premium pricing based on quantified Impacts

Impact solutions

Contact us to discover how to measure, forecast, and improve your Impacts

Let's talk

What Sets Us Apart

What sets us apart

Impact-washing free

Different scopes of assessment

Holistic framework approach

Data verification process

AI-supported data modelling

Our Science-based Impact Accounting Framework uniquely offers:

> Evidence-based assessments — rigorous, data-driven, and impact-washing-free

> Objective rules for material KPIs — ensuring clarity, comparability, and credibility

> A long-term vision — guiding organizations toward a sustainable market economy by 2050 and beyond

Assessment scopes

Impacts go beyond direct operations of your investments. Our tool lets you define the assessment scope of your investments:

> Direct operations 
> Operations + upstream value chain
> Downstream value chain
> Entire value chain (upstream – downstream)

This flexibility ensures assessments are aligned with your sustainability strategy — whether focused on operations alone or the entire value chain.

Topics of PI’s Science-based Targets Path® include Climate, Water, Biodiversity, Health, Social Matters and Tax (net)

Holistic framework

The PI Science-based Targets Path® provides a holistic view of organizational impacts, covering six key sustainability topics: climate change, water, biodiversity (nature), health, social matters, and net tax. Together, these are measured through 14 science-based indicators such as CO₂e.

Each indicator is selected because it is:

> Science-based — linked to societal targets or derivable from historical values

> Relevant — directly connected to organizational, project, investment, or consumption activities

> Transparent — measurable along the value chain, preventing “outsourcing” of negative impacts

> Graded — providing performance levels beyond binary compliance

> Neutral — free from party-political bias

Rigorous data verification process 

Data integrity is essential. Our verification process ensures your impact assessment is as complete and reliable as possible:

> Check completeness — review all data provided and close gaps with robust estimation methods

> Assess reliability — evaluate internal controls and validate where external audits exist

> Ensure comparability — fill missing data points consistently so results remain fair and benchmarkable

This rigorous process gives you confidence that your results are trustworthy, transparent, and decision-ready.

AI-supported data modeling

Our tool uses AI-powered modeling to close data gaps and ensure completeness. By leveraging your CRM data, revenue, spend, and industry benchmarks, we deliver a reliable, comprehensive assessment — even when some inputs are missing.

This capability makes our framework uniquely powerful, offering a level of analysis and coverage rarely matched in the market.

Impact Materiality

Impact Materiality made measurable

Impact Materiality assessments are the basis of any sustainability strategy and governance. We combine quantitative approaches with feasible stakeholder input to assess the positive and negative impacts of your organization and your investments on society and the environment.

Our fact-based double materiality matrix shows how we can apply our science-based thresholds onto any impact materiality scale, giving you clear objective results on your impact material topics (C and A) as well as a fact-based process to determine your financial material topics (A and B).
The example shows how our fact-based impact materiality assessment can turn perception upside-down, saving you money, avoiding over- or under-estimating risks and opportunities.

Our methodology includes:

  • Scoring on a scale that you choose, where we map our science-based thresholds for climate, water, nature, and social topics to your chosen cut-off
  • Integration of stakeholder perception and expert input
  • Tailored approach that best fits the maturity of your impact materiality processes
  • Alignment with CSRD’s double and a useful input for IFRS’s single materiality requirements

This ensures that your impact materiality assessment is not just compliant (if relevant), but meaningful. It helps you prioritize actions, allocate resources, and communicate with confidence.

Under CSRD, not only missing out material impacts, but also the reporting on non-material topics is non-compliant. We help you get it right – what to focus on – and go beyond.