How to Improve Your CDP Score: What Moves the Needle

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As a CDP Gold Accredited Provider, KERAMIDA has supported organizations across industries through the full CDP disclosure process, from data collection to final submission. This guide draws on that experience and presents a practical checklist of the areas where we most consistently see organizations, including experienced ESG teams, have room to improve.

CDP is one of the most widely used environmental disclosure frameworks, enabling investors, customers, and financial institutions to evaluate how organizations measure, manage, and disclose their environmental impacts, risks, and opportunities.

In 2025, more than 22,000 companies disclosed through CDP, representing a significant share of global market capitalization. At the same time, financial institutions with over $110 trillion in assets requested environmental data highlighting CDP’s growing role in capital allocation and supply chain engagement.

Responding to CDP, however, can be complex, particularly for organizations that manage large datasets or are unfamiliar with CDP’s structure and requirements.

CDP uses a structured scoring methodology that is often misunderstood even by experienced ESG teams. Performance is not determined solely by the actions an organization takes, but by how clearly those actions are defined, supported, and communicated within the response. Strong disclosures typically:

  • Understand the questions that have the greatest impact on scoring outcomes

  • Address key requirements that determine progression between scoring levels

  • Maintain alignment across data and methodologies

Unlike many reporting frameworks, CDP evaluates the responses themselves rather than the supporting documentation. As a result, the quality, clarity, and consistency of each answer play a critical role in overall performance.

Where CDP Scores Are Won and Lost

Not all CDP questions carry equal weight. The seven areas in the checklist below are those that typically have the greatest impact on CDP scores across sectors and industries. Together, they form a practical tool you can use to evaluate your current disclosure and identify where to focus. They do not cover every question in the questionnaire, but they cover the ones that most strongly influence scores.

Important

Don't overlook CDP's Essential Criteria

CDP's Essential Criteria are requirements that exist separately from the scoring thresholds. Even if your response meets the minimum score for a given level, you will not qualify for that level unless you also satisfy all Essential Criteria for it. This distinction catches many experienced ESG teams off guard. Review the Essential Criteria document alongside the Scoring Methodology before finalizing your response.

Two aspects of CDP's structure are worth understanding before working through the checklist.

The full CDP corporate questionnaire has 13 modules.

  • Modules 1–6 and 13 are integrated, meaning questions may address multiple environmental topics.

  • Modules 7–11 relate to Environmental Performance and are specific to individual areas:

    • Climate Change (Module 7)

    • Forests (Module 8)

    • Water Security (Module 9)

    • Plastics (Module 10 — not scored)

    • Biodiversity (Module 11 — not scored)

This checklist is structured around the Climate Change questionnaire. Because CDP modules are largely integrated, the same principles generally apply across the integrated modules.

The 7-Part Checklist to Boost Your CDP Score

Get your energy & emissions data right

Connected to Module 7: Environmental Performance

Reporting emissions is a prerequisite to understanding and reducing negative environmental impacts. Accurate and complete emissions disclosure is foundational to CDP scoring. CDP promotes the widely accepted reporting principles of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol to guide organizations' disclosure and ensure a true and fair account of their environmental data.
Report complete Scope 1, Scope 2, and relevant Scope 3 emissions data using recognized methodologies such as the Greenhouse Gas Protocol
Disclose at least one Scope 3 relevant category from: Purchased goods and services, Capital goods, Transport (upstream or downstream), or Processing and use of sold products
Clearly document your approach to reporting emissions, including calculation methods and assumptions
Identify and report any emissions sources within your reporting boundary that are excluded from your disclosure
Provide your base year, base year emissions, and the rationale for your base year selection

Develop supplier engagement strategies

Connected to Module 5: Value Chain Considerations

Engaging with value chain stakeholders is essential for organizations to drive progress on environmental issues associated with their operations. Without supplier engagement, it is difficult to demonstrate meaningful management of Scope 3 emissions.
Engage high-impact suppliers and request their Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions data
Integrate supplier-reported emissions data into your own calculations and reporting
Embed climate and environmental requirements into procurement policies and contracts
Set clear expectations for suppliers on environmental performance, including training and incentives for compliance.

Assess climate risks & opportunities

Connected to Module 2: Identification, Assessment & Disclosure of Risks and Opportunities

CDP evaluates how well organizations define, assess, and manage climate-related risks and opportunities. This includes how risks are considered across different time horizons, how "substantive" impacts are defined, and the processes in place to identify, assess, and manage environmental dependencies, impacts, risks, and opportunities.
Establish a formal process to identify, assess, and manage climate risks and opportunities across direct operations and the value chain
Disclose at least one climate-related risk and at least one climate-related opportunity
Assess each risk and opportunity based on its potential financial or strategic impact on the business
Link identified risks and opportunities explicitly to business strategy and financial planning

Align governance & accountability

Connected to Module 4: Governance

Strong governance is demonstrated through public environmental policies, board-level oversight, clear management responsibilities, the use of incentives, and the integration of environmental information into mainstream reporting.
Define clear management roles and responsibilities for environmental oversight
Establish board-level oversight of environmental issues, including frequency and format of reporting to the board
Document board-level competency in understanding and responding to environmental issues
Align governance structures with strategic environmental decisions
Link climate performance metrics to executive incentives or compensation
Integrate non-financial environmental metrics and data into mainstream financial reports
Ensure direct and indirect policy engagement activities are transparent and consistent with your climate commitments

Connect strategy to financial planning

Connected to Module 5: Business Strategy

CDP evaluates how environmental considerations are embedded into strategy and financial decisions. Organizations that integrate these elements into their core strategy are better positioned to achieve higher CDP scores.
Link identified climate risks and opportunities explicitly to business strategy and risk management processes
Use scenario analysis to assess future climate impacts and inform strategic decisions
Develop a credible, publicly available Climate Transition Plan aligned with a 1.5°C pathway, including capital allocation and decarbonization actions
Ensure board-level oversight of transition plan development and progress monitoring
Align capital investment decisions (CAPEX and OPEX) with climate priorities and transition goals

Set emissions reduction targets

Connected to Module 7: Environmental Performance

Targets are key differentiators in CDP scoring. Target setting provides direction and structure to environmental strategy. Providing information on quantitative targets and qualitative goals, as well as progress made against them, can demonstrate your commitment to improving climate-related issue management.
Set clear, quantitative emissions reduction targets with defined boundaries, base years, and methodologies
Align targets with a recognized framework such as the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) or a 1.5°C pathway
Track and disclose progress against targets on a consistent basis
Implement emissions reduction initiatives with defined outcomes and timelines
Link emissions reduction actions to capital investment decisions and business planning

Verify emissions & other data

Connected to Module 7: Environmental Performance & Module 13: Further Information and Sign off

CDP supports third-party verification and assurance as good practice in environmental reporting, as it ensures the reliability of the disclosed data and processes.
Obtain third-party verification of Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions
Extend third-party verification to Scope 3 emissions where relevant
Clearly define the boundaries, standards, and level of assurance applied to your verification
Work toward verifying additional environmental information, including energy consumption, emissions reduction initiatives, transition plans, and supplier compliance with environmental requirements

Final Thoughts

Improving a CDP score requires both strengthening environmental performance and aligning disclosures with how CDP evaluates that performance.

Organizations that focus on emissions completeness, value chain engagement, quantified risks and opportunities analysis, governance alignment, credible targets, and measurable action are better positioned to strengthen both their disclosures and their scores.

Looking ahead, CDP is expected to expand its coverage of nature-related topics and refine questions on adaptation and resilience in the 2026 cycle, making this an important time to assess where your disclosure stands.

How KERAMIDA Can Help

A strong CDP response requires more than collecting data. It requires aligning that information with CDP's scoring methodology and expectations across every module.

Our CDP services include:

Contact us or call (800) 508-8034 to speak with one of our CDP disclosure experts.

Author

Anastasia Kyrmanidou, Ph.D.
Senior Manager, Sustainability Strategy & Reporting
KERAMIDA Inc.

Contact Anastasia at akyrmanidou@keramida.com

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