Battery Passport 3.0 - Individual consultant scope of work

Battery Passport 3.0 indicator development – Consultant scope of work 

Battery Passport Overview 

The Global Battery Alliance (GBA) is built on the vision of a circular, responsible and just battery value chain in 2030. The GBA Battery Passport is the GBA’s flagship programme for achieving this vision, by providing a sustainability framework for companies in the battery value chain to meet legislative expectations and to go beyond compliance.  

The vision of the GBA Battery Passport is to accelerate the scaling of sustainable, responsible, and circular battery value chains by:  

1. Establishing a global battery passport ecosystem, including harmonized sustainability performance expectations for batteries  

1. Making company efforts measurable, trusted and comparable  

1. Tracking and rewarding improvement actions across the value chain with a comprehensive ESG score for consumers 

The Global Battery Alliance (GBA) Battery Passport will produce a cohesive framework that sets expectations for sustainability performance in the battery supply chain, guides supply chain companies to demonstrate their sustainability performance, assures the credibility of sustainability performance data, and allows the measurement and comparison of supply chain sustainability performance.  

The GBA Battery Passport will enable the benchmarking and comparison of supply chain sustainability performance, at the level of individual batteries. This will contribute to a marketplace where products can compete on independently validated and verifiable sustainability performance, and companies can differentiate themselves to customers, investors and end consumers with robust and trustable green claims. Ultimately, this scoring system will incentivise improved sustainability performance throughout the battery supply chain.    

In the previous phases 1.0 and 2.0 of the Battery Passport development, the GBA achieved the following milestones:  

• The publication of a comprehensive Greenhouse Gas Rulebook for calculating battery carbon footprints, which supports the development of methodology for the EU Commission Delegated Regulation on battery carbon footprinting, and exceeds legislative requirements for data assurance and comparability;  

• The publication of prototype child labour, human rights, biodiversity loss, circular design, forced labour and Indigenous Peoples’ rights rulebooks, which identify baseline expectations and metrics for relevant due diligence processes;  

• The successful delivery of two piloting programmes, launching the world’s first battery passport proof-of-concept in January 2023, and in 2024 conducting the world's largest, pre-competitive effort by battery cell manufacturers to establish comparable battery passports. This effort has involved 10 pilot consortia, which include cell makers representing over 80% of global electric vehicle battery market share. 

In the next phase, Battery Passport 3.0, our aim is to develop the remaining ESG issue rulebooks and revise the existing ESG-issue rulebooks (see Figure 1).  

Figure 1. Battery Passport issue categories1 

 

 

The GBA has already produced preliminary and partial mappings of ESG issues, regulations and standards, which need to be updated and structured into performance expectations for the Battery Passport 3.0 framework. 

The next phase of rulebook development should follow a refined approach building on lessons from previous phases and the pilots conceptualized by the Secretariat, and incorporate the following key considerations : 

• Developing and refining a set of indicators to form a comprehensive framework for benchmarking mineral supply chain sustainability performance.   

• Aligning the Battery Passport indicator framework with the minimum due diligence expectations of the EU Batteries Regulation, OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Business Conduct and Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains of Minerals from Conflict-Affected and High-Risk Areas, and embedding a risk-based due diligence approach throughout.  

• Harnessing equivalency frameworks for voluntary sustainability standards to allow efficient recognition of sites’ existing sustainability achievements in Battery Passport scoring.  

• Identifying gaps in existing standards’ coverage of ESG issues and documenting expectations related to those gaps. 

• Lend itself to an ESG scoring framework feeding into the GBA’s product certification for batteries. 

The GBA is seeking to engage an individual consultant to support the next phase of Battery Passport indicator development. 

Objectives of the assignment 

The objectives of the assignment are to: 

• Draft high-level sustainability indicators in each ESG area in scope of the Battery Passport, based on a range of norms established in existing voluntary sustainability standards and legislation, and organized according to the OECD 6-step approach and EU Batteries Regulation due diligence guidance.  

• Produce a comprehensive mapping of the Battery Passport indicator framework  to the sustainability performance expectations of selected existing standards, including clarifying the scope and boundaries of the defined ESG issues where necessary 

• Support the Secretariat in drafting a guidance note on use of the Battery Passport as support for EU Batteries Regulation compliance 

• Support the Secretariat in preparing drafts and discussion documents for the GBA’s multi-stakeholder working group meetings, document and implement suggested revisions based on feedback 

• Support the Secretariat in populating the benchmarking of standards’ governance structures, data assurance practices, transparency, etc. according to existing guidance 

• Support the Secretariat in preparing the indicator framework and methodology for public consultation 

Timeline and deliverables 

The concrete deliverables are as follows:  

Deliverable	Timeline
Finalised mapping of issue and regulatory coverage across standards and regulations   Fully defined scope of each ESG rulebook	January-February 2025
Standard benchmarking framework developed, consulted in working groups and validated in Steering Committee	February-March 2025
New issue rulebook expectations drafted and consulted/scored within working groups	February-May 2025
Existing rulebooks revised and consulted/scored within working groups	April-June 2025
Indicator framework ready for public consultation	July 2025
Additional support elements to the Secretariat:  EU Batteries Regulation guidance note  Etc.	February-June 2025

 

Requirements:  

Mid- to senior level individual consultant with the following experience and qualifications:  

Required: 

• A Master’s degree in law, environmental management, political science, economics, engineering/science, or in another discipline directly relevant to the assignment, or demonstrated equivalent professional experience relevant to the battery value chain 

• Regulatory, policy and practical understanding and experience on the environmental, social and governance contexts of battery value chains, especially (battery) mineral production and due diligence  

• Experience in developing, using and analyzing battery mineral value chain-relevant ESG performance and due diligence standards, especially upstream standards 

• An understanding of the key international due diligence and responsible business conduct guidance and conventions: UNGP, ILO, OECD and others  

• Demonstrated experience in producing high-quality, concrete tools and deliverables related to the above landscape 

• Excellent written and spoken English  

• Attention to detail, ability to distill complex information into clear and understandable language and visual presentation 

• Excellent command of MS Office suite (including Excel) and other IT tools for managing complex and large sets of data and documents (such as the indicator framework at different levels of depth, feedback logs, etc.) 

Desired: 

• Experience in working in a multi-stakeholder environment and an understanding of consensus building  

• Experience in environmental due diligence and stewardship along the battery value chain and especially mining 

Roles of the GBA 

GBA Secretariat: 

• Providing existing drafts and resources, background documents, guidance, feedback and quality assurance of consultant deliverables   

• Facilitating Working Group meetings and inputs for indicator development  

Working Groups: 

• Bringing subject matter expertise on rulebooks/indicators into discussion on performance expectations, based on drafts produced by Secretariat/consultant (verbal and/or written inputs) 

• Validating proposed expectations and principles for each issue/rulebook 

• Rating/scoring existing standards expectations and principles 

Steering Committee: 

• Oversee direction and technical quality of work 

• Sign off indicator framework 

• Sign off overall methodological guidance for rulebooks/indicators (including engagement/endorsement principles of standards) 

• Sign off final rulebooks 

Estimated level of effort: 

The GBA is seeking an individual consultant to engage full time for 6 months. Ideal start date is mid-January. The consultant will report to Programme Manager, GBA Secretariat. 

How to apply: 

Please send your CV, desired daily rate in EUR and motivation letter (max. 2 pages) responding directly to each of the above requirements and demonstrating concrete examples and references to secretariat@globalbattery.org . Please provide contact details of at least two references related to previous experience. 

Application deadline: 29th December. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis.