About GRESB

 
GRESB

GRESB (http://gresb.com/), the Global ESG Benchmark for Real Assets, is an annual benchmarking assessment to measure ESG integration of owners and asset managers for real assets (real estate and infrastructure) and funds. It was founded in 2009 by a group of European institutional investors who played leading roles in launching Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI), and is employed worldwide now. GRESB is composed of two organizations, GRESB Foundation, where GRESB Standards are developed and managed and GRESB B.V., which offers various services, in order to separate functions and enhance organizational transparency.


Currently, there are about 150 "Investor Members" using GRESB data upon their investment decision-making and engagement processes with investees. In Japan, about 10 institutions including Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF) have been the members (as of Oct 2023). Also "Industry Partners" such as ARES (Association for Real Estate Securitization) are promoting GRESB in the market.


CSR Design Green Investment Advisory, Co., Ltd. has been officially promoting GRESB in the Japanese market since 2011, and is designated as the recommended Premier Partner for Japan.


Each GRESB Assessment is open during April to July every year, and the result is launched in October. Detailed result is available for "GRESB Investor Members". Thus, GRESB Assessment works as a reporting tool from real estate/infrastructure companies and funds as well as a monitoring tools of their ESG performance.


In case you are considering collecting information on ESG initiatives of real estate and infrastructure companies and funds, and/or checking the level of your own ESG initiatives on a global basis, we encourage you to participate in the GRESB assessment. Also, if you wish to incorporate ESG-related information into your investment and financing decisions, please consider becoming an Investor Member.



GRESB Assessments

GRESB Assessment is broadly divided into two categories: GRESB Real Estate, which evaluates efforts in standing investments and development of new construction and major renovation projects, and GRESB Infrastructure, which evaluates efforts in infrastructure funds and assets. In addition, GRESB Public Disclosure Assessment is conducted for both Real Estate and Infrastructure, which measures the quality of information disclosure.


GRESB Variations



GRESB Real Estate

Inaugurated in 2009, 14th annual assessment was conducted in 2023. Although there have been green building certifications such as CASBEE (Japan), LEED (US) and BREEAM (UK), GRESB is virtually the only benchmarking tool of company or fund level sustainability performance in the real estate sector.


Several agencies provide ESG assessments or ratings of issuers. That said, GRESB is regarded as de-facto standard in the real estate sector and has taken its place as a global standard by collaborating with various global frameworks such as reporting frameworks including PRI and SASB, PCAF which is the global GHG accounting standard for financed emissions, and CRREM which is an analysis tool for climate change transition risks in the real estate sector. Because of investors’ active commitment for its development and operation, it covers material issues from investors view points, and is used for due diligence and monitoring of real estate investments by institutional investors.


Real Estate Assessment

In 2023, 2,084 entities participated in GRESB Real Estate Assessment globally. From Japan, 135 (65 listed entities including 57 J-REITs, and 70 private entities from 45 companies) reported to the Assessment. It is noteworthy that a yet higher number of 99.5% of J-REITs (based on market cap. as of 6 October 2023) participated in the 2023 Assessment. Among the global participants, Japan has ranked the 3rd in terms of the number of the participants, following the United States and the United Kingdom.


2019 Response Rate_Japan


GRESB Real Estate Assessment offers two benchmarks, namely "Standing Investment Benchmark", which assesses commercial real estate operation, and "Development Benchmark", which focuses on new development and major renovation projects. Both are evaluated with 5-star rated “GRESB Rating”, where “5 Stars” is the highest rank for Participants in the top quintile based on the global ranking of GRESB Overall Score.


GRESB Public Disclosure

"GRESB Public Disclosure" was launched in 2017 to assess the levels of ESG information disclosure of listed real estate companies and funds. It achieves full coverage of the major developed listed real estate indices, which resulted in assessing 784 listed vehicles in 2023.



GRESB Infrastructure

Launched in 2016, "GRESB Infrastructure" marked the 8th year in 2023. It is the only benchmark that provides ESG assessment on an investable fund-by-fund basis in the infrastructure sector. It consists of two assessments, namely "Fund Assessment" evaluating infrastructure funds, and "Asset Assessment" benchmarking infrastructure assets and companies which such funds invest in.


The "Fund Assessment" mainly examines how ESG issues are integrated into the investment management process of infrastructure investment funds, while the "Asset Assessment" comprehensively assesses ESG initiatives, including ESG management systems in the operations of the infrastructure companies and assets to be invested in, performance results such as GHG emissions, and the status of ESG risk assessments and stakeholder engagement. Another feature of the " Asset Assessment " is that the score allocation takes into account the importance of individual ESG items depending on the sector and location of the infrastructure asset.

The number of participants has been steadily increasing each year. Operators in the transportation sector, such as airports, railroads, and roads, network-related facilities, such as data centers, and entities that operate social infrastructure, such as schools and hospitals, are the examples of the participants. Globally, 172 funds and 687 assets (166 funds and 652 assets in 2022) participated in 2023. From Japan, 3 assets participated.


GRESB Public Disclosure is also available for infrastructure, and 234 constituents were assessed globally in 2023.


In September 2022, the Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF), already a member in Real Estate, became Japan's first investor member in Infrastructure as well. Further recognition is expected in the future.


Contact


For further information, please email us by clicking the "Contact" at the top right of this web page.

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