EU taxonomy eligibility and alignment dataset for non-financial European companies (2023)

Abstract

This dataset contains structured information on the eligibility and alignment of economic activities reported by European companies under the EU Taxonomy framework. It includes financial Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) such as Turnover, Capital Expenditure (CapEx), and Operational Expenditure (OpEx) aligned with specific EU Taxonomy activity codes and environmental objectives.

This dataset was created to assess the level of eligibility and alignment of economic activities reported under the EU Taxonomy regulation for the financial year 2023. A representative sample of 399 companies was selected from a larger population (n=1976) using the R statistical software, ensuring proportional coverage across countries and industries based on revenue data from Thomson Reuters EIKON.

EU Taxonomy disclosures were extracted from annual or sustainability reports published by the selected companies. Data collection followed a semi-automated process using GPT-4o, where PDF pages containing Taxonomy tables were isolated and processed with a custom prompt to extract relevant indicators (Turnover, CapEx, OpEx), activity codes, and alignment levels. Additional fields such as sector, objective, and country were added to facilitate comparative analysis. The final dataset is structured and quality-checked for consistency and completeness.

It allows for cross-country and cross-sector benchmarking, and supports empirical research in sustainable finance, ESG reporting, and environmental policy.