The Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) is poised to "greatly expand" its operations after scooping the $1.5m Zayed Future Energy Prize yesterday in Abu Dhabi.

Over 3,000 organisations currently use the UK-based NGO's methodologies to measure and disclose their greenhouse gas emissions, while CDP has also run successful programmes to promote corporate water use disclosure and to help cities around the world report on their environmental impacts.

Speaking after the award ceremony, executive chairman Paul Dickinson told BusinessGreen that winning the high profile prize means the 10-year-old organisation can extend its reach beyond the 550 institutional investors that it currently acts on behalf of and continue to work towards harmonising global reporting standards.

"We have 72 per cent of the world's 58 largest cities reporting to us at the moment [and] we're greatly expanding that programme," he said. "We're expanding into water disclosure – we're in our second year of that – and we're working to set accounting standards for environmental disclosure."

He added that the fresh funding would allow the organisation to expand its work in these areas. "With all of these programmes, it's quite tough as a charity," he said. "What fundamentally constrains us is resources and this prize is going to allow our charity to greatly expand."

CDP won the SME and NGO category ahead of two runners-up, US campaign group the Environmental Defense Fund and Orb Energy, a company supplying solar-powered products in India.

These organisations receive $500,000 and $1m respectively, while Dr Ashok Gadgil, director of the Environmental Energy Technologies Division of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, won the $500,000 Lifetime Achievement Award.

A jury including President Ólafur Ragnar Grimsson of Iceland, President Mohammed Nasheed of the Maldives, actor Leonardo DiCaprio, former tennis player Andre Agassi, and Cherie Blair awarded Dr Gadgil the prize for his Darfur stoves project, which uses only small amounts of firewood, reduces air pollution, and means women in Sudan spend less time gathering fuel.