SBTi publishes guidance for buildings, transport, steel, cement, maritime, FLAG, power, aviation, chemicals and apparel. What exists, its vintage, and why oil and gas has no route.
Updated 11 October 2026: sectors and versions checked against SBTi’s sector pages on this date. The first version of this article missed the aviation, chemicals and apparel guidance and implied that oil and gas companies could use the general corporate route. They cannot.
Setting a science-based target is not one process. For some sectors SBTi publishes a specific pathway; for most others you work through the general corporate route; and for one, oil and gas, there is currently no route at all. Knowing which applies to you saves a good deal of wasted effort.
What exists
| Sector | Current document | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Buildings | Buildings Criteria V1.2, July 2026 | Minor clarifications to V1.1. Includes a target-setting tool |
| Supplier engagement | Guidance v1.1, July 2025 | Applies across sectors |
| Land transport | Guidance v1.1, October 2024 | SDA transport tool. An Automotive Sector Net-Zero Standard is in development, final version expected no earlier than Q3 2026 |
| Forest, Land and Agriculture (FLAG) | v1.1, December 2023 | Revision to version 2 under way |
| Chemicals | Chemical Sector Pathways and Implementation Criteria, December 2025 | Covers primary, base, intermediate, specialty and consumer chemicals, pharmaceuticals and chemical recycling |
| Steel | Guidance v1.0, July 2023 | |
| Maritime transport | Guidance v1.1, May 2023 | Includes a tool |
| Cement | Guidance v1.0, September 2022 | |
| Aviation | Guidance, August 2021, with an interim 1.5°C pathway, February 2023 | For airlines and for companies that buy aviation services |
| Power | 1.5°C quick start guide for electric utilities, minor revision September 2026 | A Power Sector Net-Zero Standard is due no earlier than Q4 2026 |
| Apparel and footwear | Sector guidance, June 2019 | Informative only, with no criteria of its own. Companies apply the cross-sector criteria |
| Aluminium | None yet | SBTi is gathering evidence from the sector. Use the cross-sector methods |
| Oil and gas | None | Commitments and validations paused. See below |
Versions and dates as published on sciencebasedtargets.org/sectors, checked 11 October 2026.
Read the vintage before you read the document
SBTi revises often, and its documents do not reliably state which version supersedes which. That makes the date on the cover load-bearing.
Aviation (August 2021), cement (September 2022), maritime transport (May 2023) and steel (July 2023) are the oldest, and the ones most likely to move next. If your target turns on a specific criterion in any of them, verify it against the SBTi website rather than the PDF on your drive. A criterion quoted confidently from a superseded document is worse than no criterion.
A bigger revision is coming for all of them. SBTi published its Corporate Net-Zero Standard Version 2.0 in June 2026 and is updating its sector standards to fit it, while adding new sectors. Its timetable is draft sector approaches by early 2027 and final versions before the end of 2027. Until then, companies use the existing sector documents. See what V2.0 changes for companies.
Oil and gas: no route, not a missing pathway
For the Gulf this is the point that matters most, and it is not a gap in guidance. SBTi has paused all commitments and validations of targets from the fossil fuel sector. A company in it cannot commit at all.
The exclusion covers any company with direct involvement in exploration, extraction, mining or production of oil, natural gas, coal or other fossil fuels, whatever share of revenue that represents. SBTi’s own examples include integrated oil and gas companies, exploration and production companies, refining and marketing companies, oil products distributors, gas distributors and retailers, and traditional oil and gas service companies. The general corporate route is not a fallback, and the Corporate Net-Zero Standard V2.0 keeps the exclusion, now tied to a dedicated fossil fuel policy.
Two qualifications:
- Subsidiaries of fossil fuel companies may join if the subsidiary is not itself a fossil fuel company. SBTi assesses each case on the subsidiary’s operating model and how its emissions relate to the parent’s. A subsidiary set up only to carry targets on part of a fossil fuel company’s inventory is not permitted.
- Some companies with limited fossil fuel revenue can commit, under thresholds SBTi sets out on its oil and gas page.
SBTi paused development of its Oil and Gas Standard in April 2025 and says the work will resume in early 2027. Its February 2026 research report on sector pathways is informative, not a route to validation. The detail is in can oil and gas companies set SBTi targets?
Chemicals and the Gulf petrochemical base
Chemicals now has its own pathways. The Chemical Sector Pathways and Implementation Criteria, issued in December 2025, set activity-specific pathways for the most emission-intensive sources in the sector and are used alongside the Corporate Net-Zero Standard and the Near-Term Criteria. They apply to producers of primary, base, intermediate, specialty and consumer chemicals, to pharmaceuticals and to chemical recycling.
For a Gulf petrochemical producer, the order of questions matters. If it sits inside an energy group, the first question is whether it passes SBTi’s subsidiary test. Only then does the chemicals pathway come into play.
Apparel and aviation
The apparel and footwear guidance is informative. It gives examples and highlights reduction opportunities, but it contains no criteria, so apparel companies are validated against the cross-sector criteria.
The aviation guidance covers passenger and cargo airlines and also companies that use aviation services, which brings in any business with significant business travel or air freight that wants to understand the sector’s pathway.
How to use this
- Check eligibility first. If your company has any direct involvement in fossil fuel production, SBTi will not accept a commitment. Check whether a subsidiary qualifies.
- Find your sector in the table and check the version before you read the document.
- If it is not there, you are on the cross-sector route. Companies setting targets now use the Corporate Net-Zero Standard V1.3.1 and the Near-Term Criteria, which stay open for submissions until 31 January 2028. Validation under V2.0 opens on 1 February 2027.
- Check supplier engagement regardless of sector. It applies to almost anyone with a material Scope 3 footprint.
- Check FLAG if you touch food, timber or fibre, including through the value chain. The threshold catches more businesses than expected, and the standard is being revised.
How ESGweise helps
We map a company to the right SBTi route, including where no sector guidance exists and the ambition case has to be built from first principles, and we do the inventory work underneath it. See our ESG strategy and carbon services, and our oil and gas and heavy industry and manufacturing practices.
If you are unsure which route applies, or whether you are eligible at all, talk to us.
Related guides
Frequently asked questions
Which sectors does SBTi publish guidance for?
As at October 2026, SBTi publishes sector guidance or criteria for buildings, land transport, forest land and agriculture (FLAG), steel, maritime transport, cement, power, aviation, chemicals, and apparel and footwear, plus supplier engagement guidance that applies across sectors. Standards for the power and automotive sectors are in development. Check the current version on the SBTi website before relying on any of them, because SBTi revises its documents often.
Can an oil and gas company set an SBTi target through the general corporate route?
No. SBTi has paused all commitments and validations of targets from the fossil fuel sector. That covers any company with direct involvement in exploration, extraction, mining or production of oil, gas, coal or other fossil fuels, whatever share of revenue it represents. The Corporate Net-Zero Standard V2.0 keeps that exclusion. Subsidiaries of fossil fuel companies that are not themselves fossil fuel companies may still qualify, assessed case by case.
Is there SBTi guidance for oil and gas?
No. SBTi paused development of its Oil and Gas Standard in April 2025 to concentrate on the Corporate Net-Zero Standard and the Financial Institutions Net-Zero Standard. Its sector page says the work will resume in early 2027. In February 2026 it published a research report on pathways and metrics for the sector, which it describes as informative and non-normative.
Which sectors have no SBTi guidance?
Oil and gas is the notable one, and companies in it cannot commit at all. Aluminium has no sector-specific approach yet; SBTi is gathering evidence from the sector and points companies to its cross-sector methods in the meantime. Any company outside the fossil fuel exclusion and without sector guidance sets targets through the general corporate route.
How do I know if the sector guidance I am reading is current?
Check the version and date on the document itself, then verify against the SBTi sector page. SBTi documents are revised often and do not always state which version supersedes which. Aviation dates from 2021, cement from 2022, and steel and maritime from 2023, so those in particular warrant a check before use.