CBGA-BASELINE: Baseline Governance

LinkedIn Post 11: CBGA-BASELINE: Baseline Governance

Your AI system reported 18% carbon reduction at Building X. That's the difference between measured energy consumption and the baseline (what the building would have consumed without the retrofit).

But what if the baseline was revised?

Subtle adjustments—occupancy assumptions, weather normalisations, operational changes—can inflate reported reductions without changing actual outcomes. It's not necessarily fraud. But the incentive is clear: a system that reports its own results has incentive to define the baseline in ways that make those results look good.

CBGA-BASELINE locks baselines at the start of each carbon budget period using defined, audit-ready methodologies. No mid-cycle revision. No tweaking to account for anomalies. And external verification—an auditor, not the optimising system—validates baselines.

This sounds bureaucratic. It is. But it's the cost of credible reporting. You can't simultaneously be the optimizer and the auditor. You need separation.

Lock baselines. Verify externally. Audit trails on every assumption. That's governance.

#DataIntegrity #CarbonAccounting #Governance #Transparency #Accountability