Inside What Fuels Fashion? 2025 Report

Big fashion’s climate promises are unravelling under scrutiny, and Fashion Revolution’s latest What Fuels Fashion? 2025 Report makes that painfully clear. The index ranks 200 billion-dollar brands, worth a combined $2.7 trillion, on how transparently they disclose their climate and energy data — and the average score is just 14%.

What “What Fuels Fashion? 2025” actually measures

What Fuels Fashion? is Fashion Revolution’s single-issue transparency index, focused solely on climate and energy, not overall “ethics” or “sustainability”. It reviews 200 of the world’s largest fashion brands and retailers, all with annual turnover above $1 billion, and scores them on public disclosure across five climate and energy themes.

Brands receive points only for information that is already in the public domain, such as corporate websites, annual reports, or linked third-party disclosures. A theoretical 100% score would mean a brand is publishing detailed supplier lists and full data on emissions, energy use, finance, just transition, and advocacy, but no brand reaches that level; the current high is 71%.

Clean heat: fashion’s biggest, most ignored climate lever

The 2025 edition frames heat as fashion’s most solvable climate challenge, since fossil fuelled boilers in dyehouses, laundries and finishing mills are the single largest source of supply chain emissions. Proven clean heat solutions such as heat pumps and electric boilers already exist and, unlike heavy industry, fashion faces relatively low barriers to electrification.

Yet transparency around this transition is minimal: only 10% of brands disclose supply chain renewable electricity targets, and just 6% share broader renewable energy targets. A mere 6% disclose any efforts to electrify high-heat processes, showing how few are willing to publish credible plans to phase out coal and scale clean heat.

Key stats that expose a transparency and accountability gap

The report paints a stark picture of how far big fashion is from climate reality:

• The average brand score is just 14%, signalling “alarmingly low” transparency while emissions continue to rise.
• Fewer than 18% of brands disclose coal phase-out targets for material processing. None includes purchased steam, leaving a major loophole that keeps coal in the system.
• Only 6% disclose how much upfront financial support they give suppliers for decarbonisation, and just 2% disclose help with ongoing operating costs, such as higher electricity bills or maintenance for new clean tech.
• Just 7% show evidence of advocating for renewable energy in garment-producing countries, and 6% disclose direct investment in grid-scale renewables.
• Publicly listed brands make up 59% of those scoring 0 on traceability, meaning they fail at the most basic level of supplier visibility despite shareholder oversight.

Even where climate targets exist, delivery is weak. Around 55% of brands have SBTi-verified targets, yet fewer than 29% show evidence they are actually cutting emissions. Only 20% are transparent about consulting suppliers on target setting, and a tiny 9% co-create climate adaptation plans with them.

Workers are on the front line of heat – but data is missing

The report stresses that safe working conditions are a human right, yet 0% of brands disclose factory heat and humidity data (Wet Bulb Globe Temperature, or WBGT) from suppliers. This is despite rising global temperatures that are already causing fainting, illness, and lost income in overheated garment factories.

Making WBGT disclosure mandatory would give workers evidence to bargain for protections, help investors assess operational and financial risk, and give brands data to cost and implement cooling systems or innovative insurance tools. Fashion Revolution and Action Speaks Louder propose a “Clean Heat for Cool Work” framework, pairing low-cost monitoring (such as WBGT) with high-investment solutions (like electrification and cooling), thereby linking climate mitigation to worker protection.

Finance, governance, and the politics of energy

The research shows climate accountability is barely embedded in fashion’s financial decisions. Only 15% of brands link executive bonuses to absolute emissions cuts and, even then, climate typically accounts for just 10% of the bonus structure. Only 7% disclose using an internal carbon price, and 20% share any supplier incentives for decarbonisation.

On energy procurement, 60% of brands disclose how they account for energy sourcing in their own operations, but only 11% do so for supply chains — and many lean heavily on Renewable Energy Credits (RECs), which the report warns can mask ongoing fossil fuel use. No brand discloses powering supply chains with real-time renewable energy every hour of the day, a benchmark the report frames as true decarbonisation.

Why this index matters – and what it is not

What Fuels Fashion? is designed as an advocacy tool and benchmarking index, not a shopping guide or ethical ranking. Fashion Revolution repeatedly stresses that a higher score means a brand is more transparent than peers, not that it is sustainable or ethical.

By targeting the 200 largest, most profitable brands — those with the greatest negative human rights and environmental impacts and the most resources — the index aims to push systemic change where it is most needed. The logic is simple: transparency is the bare minimum and a necessary first step; without it, decarbonisation plans cannot be properly designed, scrutinised, or enforced.

As Liv Simpliciano, Head of Policy & Research at Fashion Revolution, said, “The path to decarbonisation will be won or lost by how fashion tackles heat. Industrial electrification is a Just Transition opportunity that must centre workers and suppliers. If fashion fails to act, it jeopardises its integrity in a world moving beyond fossil fuels — and with it, the health, safety, and dignity of the people who make our clothes.”