Jaclyn Sherman's path into carbon accounting started in the field, monitoring water quality on the Yuba River, tracking aquatic invasive species, and working on meadow restoration and carbon sequestration projects in the Sierra foothills. That hands-on background now shapes how she approaches one of the most technical corners of sustainability work: GHG inventory assurance.

Today Jaclyn is a Sustainability Analyst at Sensiba LLP, a top-100 U.S. accounting firm and the first California-based firm to earn B Corp certification. She leads GHG assurance engagements for food and beverage clients and has built her expertise through a combination of the GHGMI diploma program, deep on-the-job learning, and the kind of stay-curious adaptability that this rapidly evolving field demands.

In this episode, Aaron and Jaclyn work through the distinction between verification, assurance, and validation; what data quality frameworks actually look like in an assurance engagement; and how readiness assessments help companies scope out where they stand before committing to a full inventory. They also build out a practical 90-day roadmap for a mid-sized food and beverage company trying to tackle Scope 3 Category 1 purchased goods, where 70% of purchases are agricultural commodities starting from scratch.

The conversation also covers inventory management plans and the practical steps practitioners can take to future-proof their inventories through methodology changes, staff turnover, and evolving emission factors. And Jaclyn shares a candid take on how AI is showing up in GHG accounting work and what that means for assurance providers trying to evaluate data they can't fully trace.

In This Episode:

• The difference between verification, assurance, and validation in GHG work
• How assurance providers evaluate data sources, data management frameworks, and methodology choices
• What readiness assessments reveal and when they add the most value
• A 90-day roadmap for Scope 3 Category 1 in agricultural supply chains
• Inventory management plans and how to future-proof a GHG inventory
• AI in GHG accounting: where it helps and where it complicates assurance
• What doing sustainability work inside a B Corp accounting firm actually looks like
• Career advice for practitioners at any stage: resources, the GHGMI diploma program, and learning on the job

Resources Mentioned:

• GHG Management Institute (GHGMI) Diploma Program: ghginstitute.org
• Sustainability Simplified newsletter by Tim Mowin
• Sensiba sustainability services: sensiba.com
• North Star Carbon & Impact: northstarcarbon.com

Connect with Jaclyn Sherman: LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jaclyn-sherman

About the Podcast: The Carbon Management and Accounting Podcast is hosted by Aaron Stainthorp and sponsored by North Star Carbon & Impact, the carbon and sustainability management platform built by sustainability professionals, for sustainability professionals.

This episode is brought to you by North Star Carbon & Impact. If you're looking for an easier, more transparent way to manage carbon and ESG data and prepare for audits, reporting, and decarbonization planning, visit northstarcarbon.com to learn more or request a demo.

What happens when a company commits to a decarbonization plan — and then someone finally reviews the baseline?

Dr. Albert Chung, Principal Engineer at GSI Environmental, has spent over 15 years verifying GHG inventories across industries. In this episode, he shares what verifiers actually see when they open an inventory for the first time, the red flags that show up before an audit even begins, and why so many decarbonization plans are built on foundations that were never independently reviewed.

We also get into the practical side of inventory management: why companies that write their IMP at the deadline are setting themselves up for pain, how to think about materiality when your sustainability team is stretched thin, and the spend-based data problem — why switching to a lower-carbon supplier won't show up as a reduction if your baseline isn't built on actionable data.

In this episode:

• The red flags verifiers look for before the audit starts
• Why inventory management plans should be built from day one, not written after the deadline
• The 5% materiality threshold — and how it differs from what sustainability teams use internally
• The spend-based trap: how your Scope 3 reduction initiatives can become invisible in your own reporting
• Why starting in Excel might be the right move, even if you're planning to use software eventually
• How to future-proof an inventory when methodology, regulations, and staff all keep changing

About the Podcast: The Carbon Management and Accounting Podcast is hosted by Aaron Stainthorp and sponsored by North Star Carbon & Impact — the carbon and sustainability management platform built by sustainability professionals, for sustainability professionals. New episodes every other Tuesday.

Learn more or request a demo: northstarcarbon.com

Derek Markolf spent 22 years at LRQA leading GHG verifications across manufacturing, agriculture, energy, and nearly every other sector. Now he runs his independent verification practice while slow-traveling the world with his wife — conducting verifications remotely from wherever they happen to be living that month.

In this conversation, Derek shares what two decades of looking inside other organizations' GHG inventories actually teaches you — the patterns that show up everywhere, the mistakes that keep getting made, and the emerging issues that practitioners need to get ahead of right now.

We cover:

→ Why the smallest sources are the biggest pain — and why this surprises first-time reporters every time

→ The "levers" problem: why spend-based and industry-average data removes your ability to show real emissions reductions

→ Base year recalculation — the most under-enforced GHG Protocol requirement, and why verifiers are giving it a lot more attention now that companies are nearing their target years

→ What inventory management plans need to contain to survive staff turnover

→ Why AI-assisted tools are creating a new challenge for verifiers: "We can't verify a black box"

→ What separates organizations that build solid, verification-ready inventories from those that struggle — and why it almost always starts with leadership commitment.

🎙️ Carbon Management & Accounting Podcast | New episodes every other Tuesday

Sponsored by North Star Carbon & Impact — northstarcarbon.com