Carbon Accounting and Emission Disclosure Practices in the Energy Sector: Pathways Toward Regulatory Convergence

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-559-1_15How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Carbon Accounting; Emission Disclosure; ESG Disclosures; GHG Protocol; Harmonization Model; Scope 1,2 & 3 Emissions

Abstract

As the call for climate accountability grows, carbon accounting will likely become increasingly significant for green governance, especially in sectors of high-emissions such as energy. This study examined how much of a priority carbon accounting and emissions disclosure were to major Indian energy firms. The data were used from sustainability reports, filings with regulatory authorities, and academic publications related to the energy sector in India to highlight unreasonable inconsistencies in carbon reporting, limited progress reporting Scope 3 disclosures, a lack of industry guidance, and weak connections to financial performance measures. While international standards for carbon accounting and emissions disclosure exist (i.e. GHG Protocol, CDP, ISO 14064), the uptake of these various standards by Indian energy firms was slow and occurred on a voluntary basis.

To clarify the barriers to carbon accounting and emissions disclosure identified in the study the research identifies an important number of regulatory, institutional, and functional gaps for effective and comparable emissions reporting. The study’s recommendations on policies includes a Carbon Accounting Disclosure Harmonization Model related to India’s energy sector that takes into account standardized emission boundaries, minimum disclosures whether they are mandated matters of disclosures, or disclosed industry reports, third party assurance, and international guidelines to ensure consistent, transparent, and useful carbon information. The research thus attempts to position regulatory alignment against capacity building as a supporting role for implementing a strong, compliance-based method of carbon accounting aligned with India’s climate obligations.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Vishal Paul
AU  - Renu Rathi
AU  - Uma Maheswari
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/04/19
TI  - Carbon Accounting and Emission Disclosure Practices in the Energy Sector: Pathways Toward Regulatory Convergence
BT  - Proceedings of the Global Innovation and Technology Summit “AAROHAN 3.0”_HSS track (GITS-HSS 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 219
EP  - 232
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-559-1_15
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-559-1_15
ID  - Paul2026
ER  -