Water and waste schedules that do not reconcile

Most sustainability disclosure can only be verified against sources outside the filing. Two BRSR schedules are exceptions. Water withdrawal, consumption and discharge can be compared as a consistency check. Waste generated, recovered and disposed can be checked in a similar way, subject to reporting boundaries, storage changes and the definitions used.

Across twenty automobile and component makers for FY2024-25, eleven reconcile the water schedule exactly. Two fall within one per cent. Seven do not. One reports consuming 171,685 KL against a withdrawal of 110,498 KL, having also discharged 61,185 KL. Another reports consumption at a tenth of withdrawal, close enough to a factor of ten to look like a decimal error. A third reports consumption exactly equal to withdrawal while disclosing 95,388 KL of discharge, which suggests the field was filled in before the discharge was taken off.

The waste schedule behaves the same way. Nine of twenty reconcile, five fall within one per cent, six do not. In the widest case the volumes recovered and disposed together come to eight per cent of the waste the filing says was generated.

These differences are review flags, not proof of a reporting error. Analysts should check units, boundaries and explanatory notes before comparing companies. The practical implication is to retain the original figures and flag differences for review rather than silently adjusting them.