# ClimRetrieve: A Benchmarking Dataset for Information Retrieval from Corporate Climate Disclosures

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2406.09818 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.09818/

## Key facts

- Cited by 12 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Agentic RAG, agents and memory, one of 15 directions in Retrieval-augmented generation.
- Builds on 12 of its 57 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 14 Jun 2024.

## Placed in

- Retrieval-augmented generation / [Agentic RAG, agents and memory](https://mlsanity.com/rag/agentic-rag-agents-and-memory/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 12 of 12)

- [Retrieval-Augmented Generation for Knowledge-Intensive NLP Tasks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2005.11401/) (2020)
- [Self-RAG: Learning to Retrieve, Generate, and Critique through Self-Reflection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.11511/) (2023)
- [BEIR: A Heterogenous Benchmark for Zero-shot Evaluation of Information Retrieval Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.08663/) (2021)
- [RAGTruth: A Hallucination Corpus for Developing Trustworthy Retrieval-Augmented Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.00396/) (2023)
- [The Power of Noise: Redefining Retrieval for RAG Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.14887/) (2024)
- [ARES: An Automated Evaluation Framework for Retrieval-Augmented Generation Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.09476/) (2023)
- [RAFT: Adapting Language Model to Domain Specific RAG](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.10131/) (2024)
- [CLIMATE-FEVER: A Dataset for Verification of Real-World Climate Claims](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.00614/) (2020)
- [CHATREPORT: Democratizing Sustainability Disclosure Analysis through LLM-based Tools](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.15770/) (2023)
- [Assessing Large Language Models on Climate Information](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.02932/) (2023)
- [ClimaText: A Dataset for Climate Change Topic Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.00483/) (2020)
- [ClimateBERT-NetZero: Detecting and Assessing Net Zero and Reduction Targets](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.08096/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 12 of 12)

- [Can LLMs Be Trusted for Evaluating RAG Systems? A Survey of Methods and Datasets](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.20119/) (2025)
- [SustainableQA: A Comprehensive Question Answering Dataset for Corporate Sustainability and EU Taxonomy Reporting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.03000/) (2025)
- [ClimateBench-M: A Multi-Modal Climate Data Benchmark with a Simple Generative Method](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.07394/) (2025)
- [Enhancing Retrieval for ESGLLM via ESG-CID -- A Disclosure Content Index Finetuning Dataset for Mapping GRI and ESRS](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.10674/) (2025)
- [pdfQA: Diverse, Challenging, and Realistic Question Answering over PDFs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.02285/) (2026)
- [UsefulBench: Towards Decision-Useful Information as a Target for Information Retrieval](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.15827/) (2026)
- [DiagnosticIQ: A Benchmark for LLM-Based Industrial Maintenance Action Recommendation from Symbolic Rules](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.08614/) (2026)
- [Climate Finance Bench](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.22752/) (2025)
- [LLM Benchmark-User Need Misalignment for Climate Change](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.26106/) (2026)
- [RAG-DIVE: A Dynamic Approach for Multi-Turn Dialogue Evaluation in Retrieval-Augmented Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.16310/) (2026)
- [Automating Multi-Hop RAG Evaluation via TRIAD: From Context Extraction to Validated Dataset Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.21558/) (2026)
- [Climate-ModernBERT: Revisiting Corpus Composition for Domain-Adaptive Continued Pretraining](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.07798/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

To handle the vast amounts of qualitative data produced in corporate climate communication, stakeholders increasingly rely on Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) systems. However, a significant gap remains in evaluating domain-specific information retrieval - the basis for answer generation. To address this challenge, this work simulates the typical tasks of a sustainability analyst by examining 30 sustainability reports with 16 detailed climate-related questions. As a result, we obtain a dataset with over 8.5K unique question-source-answer pairs labeled by different levels of relevance. Furthermore, we develop a use case with the dataset to investigate the integration of expert knowledge into information retrieval with embeddings. Although we show that incorporating expert knowledge works, we also outline the critical limitations of embeddings in knowledge-intensive downstream domains like climate change communication.