On 17 June, ISO opened ISO/DIS 14060 for public consultation: the first international, independently verifiable standard that defines when a company’s transition plan is genuinely “net zero aligned”. It landed exactly one week after SBTi published version 2.0 of its Corporate Net-Zero Standard. That timing isn’t a coincidence: in seven days, the whole ecosystem moved.
For years, “net zero” has been a word each company filled in its own way. That’s ending. Let’s look at what ISO 14060 is, what changes for you, and why this summer marks a before and after.
What ISO 14060 is (and what it isn’t)
First, let’s clear up a common mix-up. ISO 14060 doesn’t measure emissions. You already have ISO 14064 and ISO 14067 for that. What 14060 does is different: it defines when a transition plan is legitimately aligned with net zero, and lets a third party verify it.
In other words: it doesn’t answer “how much do I emit?”, but “is my plan to reach zero credible, or is it marketing?”. It’s the first time there’s an international, consensus-based, auditable answer to that question. The draft was developed over almost two years with hundreds of experts from more than 170 countries, one of the largest working groups in ISO’s history.
The public consultation is open for 12 weeks, until early September. Final publication is expected in late 2026 or early 2027.
The net zero calendar, 2026–2028
Two frameworks, one direction.
Carbon credits no longer count as progress
This is the change that will sting the most, and it’s worth saying plainly. Under ISO 14060, you can’t use carbon credits to claim progress toward your reduction targets. Not interim ones, not final ones.
SBTi says exactly the same in its version 2.0: credits don’t count toward scope 1, 2 or 3 targets. Two reference frameworks, the same week, closing the same door.
What does that mean in practice? That a lot of net zero strategies built around “I reduce what I can and offset the rest” stop being valid. Real reductions come first. Offsetting gets pushed into a very specific role: contributing to global net zero beyond your value chain, and, only at the end of the road, neutralising residual emissions with permanent removals.
What “net zero” means under the standard
ISO 14060 defines net zero as the point where you’ve reduced your emissions down to a residual, and you neutralise that residual with durable CO₂ removals.
And here’s the detail that separates the serious plan from the aspirational one: you can’t label something “residual” just because it’s expensive or awkward to reduce. The standard asks for a documented, publicly available feasibility analysis to justify any residual that exceeds your sectoral pathway. The removals that neutralise that residual have to meet six quality criteria: durable storage (minimum 100 years), additional, independently quantified, free from carbon leakage, not double-counted, and credibly accounted for.
No open bar. Everything traceable.
Four stages, not one declaration
Instead of a single “we are net zero” declaration, the standard sets out four progressive stages. Each with its own requirements, timelines, and even the specific language you’re allowed to use to communicate it externally.
The logic is simple: a company just starting out isn’t in the same place as one with validated targets and a plan underway, and they shouldn’t be saying the same thing. The entry stage, for example, is valid for two years: if you don’t publish an inventory, interim targets and a transition plan within that window, you have to withdraw the claim. And if you drift significantly from your pathway and don’t disclose it in time, same thing.
Translation: communicating net zero progress stops being a storytelling exercise and becomes a commitment with an expiry date.
Why this connects straight to your CSRD
If you report under CSRD, pay attention. ESRS E1 asks you for a climate transition plan. Until now, “credible transition plan” was a slightly fuzzy concept, open to interpretation.
ISO 14060 gives it a backbone. It’s very likely to become the reference an auditor cites when checking whether your transition plan holds up. Having your plan aligned with a verifiable international standard stops being a bonus and starts looking like the baseline.
Same if you have SBTi targets: the convergence between the two frameworks means the rules of the game are now stricter, more explicit and more auditable than they were a month ago.
What it actually takes to get here
Strip out the noise and one thing remains: all of this rests on data. A verifiable transition plan, no credits as a shortcut, with residuals you have to justify one by one and removals that meet six quality criteria, doesn’t get built with a spreadsheet and good intentions.
You need to measure scope 1, 2 and 3 with traceability from source to report. You need to prove, year after year, that progress is real and not just accounting. You need the data you use for SBTi to be the same data you use for your CSRD, your auditor, and the client asking the question.
At Dcycle we help companies build exactly that foundation: measure with the traceability that holds up in front of an auditor, an investor or a customer, and reuse the same data across every framework without recalculating anything.
If you have net zero targets, or you’re about to set them, and want to see how to connect measurement with a plan that survives verification, book a demo. The standard no longer asks what you promise. It asks where the number comes from.