A growing number of chief executive officers are confident in their firms’ ability to achieve corporate net zero goals, supported by artificial intelligence (AI), according to a new report by global advisory and accounting firm KPMG. From a survey of more than 1,300 CEOs worldwide, 61 per cent of CEOs said they are on track to hit their net-zero targets by 2030, KPMG revealed in a report published on Tuesday, and meeting net-zero targets by using AI is cited as an increasingly popular method. This marks a 10 percentage point increase from the 51 per cent of CEOs which expressed confidence in achieving their climate targets last year.

“While attitudes toward environmental, social and governance (ESG) vary across regions, the KPMG 2025 CEO Outlook indicates that most corporate leaders remain strongly committed to their sustainability goals and are increasingly confident of meeting them,” the report said.

The increased confidence was attributed to businesses reviewing and reassessing their interim climate goals to be more realistic and aligned with core business strategy, said KPMG.

CEOs were also more bullish on achieving their net zero targets using the strategic application of AI. The top use cases include improving sustainability-related data quality and reporting (79 per cent), identifying opportunities for resource efficiency (78 per cent), and directly reducing emissions and improving energy efficiency (78 per cent), the survey found.

The report did not mention whether CEOs had considered the energy and water resources needed for data centres to power AI, which has been a subject of concern for environmental experts.

“I am encouraged that, despite the challenging macro conditions, leaders remain strongly committed to ESG issues,” said John McCalla-Leacy, global head of ESG at KPMG International. “The leap in confidence around net-zero sends out a positive signal and could help build momentum toward achieving collective decarbonisation goals.”

However, the path to decarbonisation is not without its hurdles. CEOs identified the top challenges as being the complexity of decarbonising supply chains (25 per cent) and a lack of skills and expertise to successfully implement solutions (21 per cent).

Comparatively, cost was seen as a lesser barrier to climate action, cited by only 11 per cent of leaders.

Read the full article about companies meeting their net-zero targets with AI at Eco-Business.