Issue

Succinctly describe the issue or problem statement that this Decision addresses. Why is a decision required? What business or technical problem does it address?

As governments worldwide tighten climate regulations, monitoring and reducing all emissions PCF management supports companies to avoid legal and financial penalties, especially in relation to Scope 3.1 emissions.  Regulations focus more on reporting on Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG), hence PCF  is not currently enforced to be provided by regulations.   Key driver is the customer impact on buying decisions focusing on more PCF friendly products.  It is of importance to customers striving for lower CO2 and greener products.  Syensqo's aim is to take control of what is happening in the supply chain.  The company needs to record and report on the activity data and emissions factor.  Currently this data is built up by experts or sourced from external databases.  There is currently no related single priority for Global Business Units (GBUs).

Syensqo needs to act with its suppliers to reduce Scope 3 emissions to reach Syensqo's climate commitment and support product competitiveness.  It enables Sysensqo to achieve group targets by understanding where emissions come from at operational, procurement and market level.   The future solution for footprint management in Syensqo needs to be determined as part of Scope 3 aligning with ERP project principles.  GBUs currently have no one priority with regards to footprint management.   There is no one version of the truth.   

A decision is required as to which the tools should manage the business and system process for footprint management, potentially replacing current tools in the Sustainability landscape.

Recommendation

Summarise the recommendation being made for the reader, leaving the pro/con evaluation and exact decision-making process to the subsequent sections.

There is an expectation that Syensqo should adopt a mainstream integrated solution for carbon footprint management at this point.  A way to understand where emissions come from at operational, procurement and market level enables Syensqo to start taking action on group targets.

The recommendation for managing carbon footprint in Syensqo is the implementation of SAP Sustainability Footprint Management as well as tbc. (Option E).

Accuracy is key for the future to govern and implement solution going forward.  It needs to be based on a data flow which represents one version of truth.   Collecting PCF data from our suppliers is instrumental to understand Syensqo's upstream Scope 3 baseline and measure progress.  

Background & Context

Explain the context in which the decision is being made.

Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) is the quantity of greenhouse gas emitted to manufacture a product from cradle to the exit gate of the Syensqo plants.  The related frameworks are the International Organization for Standardisation (ISO) and Together for Sustainability (TfS), a joint initiative of chemical companies.  Sustainability footprint management in Syensqo is split as follows:

• Emissions management
• Water management (out of scope for this KDD)
• Energy management  (out of scope for this KDD)
• Land use  (out of scope for this KDD)

This KDD covers the direct emissions as part of Scope 3 only.  Hence, the following activities are to be considered as part of the scope for this KDD:

• Upstream activities - reported 4.2Mt of GHG emissions in 2023
  • Raw materials and fuels
    • Extraction
    • Processing
    • Transport and distribution
  • Waste
• Downstream activities - reported 1.9Mt of GHG emissions in 2023
  • Processing of products sold
  • Use of products sold
  • End-of-life treatment

Resource and time constraints are currently hindering to go beyond Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) e.g. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA).  Regulations focus more on reporting ESG than on PCF.  Customer impact deciding to buy more PCF friendly products.   Some customers may stop selling otherwise. Business continuity impact.  PCF also needed for corporate ESG disclosures, especially 3.1.

Digital sustainability of the current solution has enabled the Syensqo for the first time ever to have product level accounting for Sustainability.  Few other companies are at same stage.  Historically PCF accounting was executed at plant or group level only.

There is an ongoing procurement initiative in Syensqo for pressuring vendors as part of scope 3.1 emissions (purchased goods an services).   Scope 3 emissions encompass in 15 different categories all indirect emissions generated throughout an organization's value chain, from the extraction of raw materials to the disposal of products.  Scope 3.1, one of those 15 categories, specifically refers to the carbon emissions associated with the products or services an organization purchases.  These emissions are bought in from suppliers and are often beyond the organization's immediate control.  Stakeholders, including investors, customers, and regulatory bodies, increasingly demand transparency and action on Scope 3.1 emissions.  Failure to comply can lead to reputational damage and financial consequences.

The 2023 Syensqo Annual Integrated Report reflects the drive to manage and reduce the footprint (see References, Chapter 4. Climate and Nature - 4.1.2 Management approach).  Syensqo has set a 2030 target to reduce by 23% Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions as compared to 2021 from its 'Focus 5' categories both upstream and downstream in the value chain, which represents over 73% of the total Scope 3 emissions.  Syensqo's 'Focus 5' categories of Scope 3 GHG emissions are:

1. Purchased goods and services (Category 1) which includes
   1. impacts of upstream transportation and distribution (Category 4)
   2. waste generated in operations (Category 5)
2. Fuel- and energy-related activities (Category 3)
3. Processing of sold products (Category 10)
4. Use of sold products (Category 11)
5. End-of-life treatment of sold products (Category 12)

The list of all categories relating to Scope 3:

In Syensqo Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions are estimated as follows:

• Emissions reported under category 3.1 (purchased goods and services) include emissions from the following two categories: 
  • 3.4 (upstream transportation and distribution) 
  • 3.5 (waste generated in operations).
• Emissions are calculated by the difference between, on one hand, cradle-to-gate emissions of products (including manufacturing) and, on the other hand, Scope 1, Scope 2 and emissions from category 3 (fuel and energy-related activities)
• Not aligned with industry practices and is not a methodology explicitly mentioned in the Technical Guidance.
• Syensqo has identified a limit in the accuracy of the methodology with the reconciliation between energy bills of materials in life cycle assessments and energy in Scope 1 and 2 emissions which affects the categories of emissions Scope 3.1, Scope 3.4 and Scope 3.5 (purchased goods and services; upstream transportation; distribution and waste generated in operations).
• The revision of the methodology for the three categories by end of 2024 builds upon progress of the Product Carbon Footprint project in 2023 and will include their direct determination (based on raw materials quantities purchased x emission factor), address the identified limitation in accuracy, disaggregate emissions in the inventory for these categories and increase the use of suppliers’ specific emission factors
• Category 3.1 encompasses purchased goods and services:
  • Syensqo carries out a cradle-to-gate Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) for most of our products, representing 93% of our total sales.  The calculated greenhouse gas emissions are extrapolated to reach the totality of our purchases. They include all emissions related to raw material extraction and precursor processing, indirect emissions from energy use for these operations, and transport between suppliers and to our plants.

Calculation

The calculations are fully manual today with some queries developed.  

The calculation of Scope 3.1 emissions according to GHG Protocol can be a complex task.  There is a choice of four different methods. The more effort these methods require, the better the results they produce:

• Spend-based method
• Average-data method
• Supplier-specific method

The calculation of Scope 3.4 and 3.9 emissions for chemical shippers generally use and activity-based calculation method to estimate transport carbon emissions. This calculation method is based on volumes, distances and emission factors for the different modes of transport.  It is important to select the most appropriate emission factor values for each mode of transport. The shipper can use either a default average emission factor for each mode or emission factors specific for his operation.   The default average emission factors used could be based on the average
emission factors recommended by Alan McKinnon, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK in his report “Measuring and Managing CO2 emissions” prepared for the European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic),  see references.  Syensqo could use these recommended average emission factors as a default for the calculation of their transport emissions as per 'Guidelines for Measuring and Managing CO2 Emissions from Freight Transport Operations' (see references) by the European Chemical Transport Association (ECTA).

Changes to carbon footprint could reduce the emission factor.  Optimisation of the process can lead to less consumption, measured at plant, and change of BOM based on lower conception.  Otherwise it is possible to change provider for energy supplies to reduce emissions factor.  Selecting suppliers with lower footprint.

Current ESG Landscape (new slide)

There are a number of applications currently in use, which contribute to carbon footprint management in Syensqo.   Current tools such as BW Cerise and PCF should be replaced.

• BW Cerise (CO2 Energy Report Improvement Software Efficiency)
  • Automatic reporting of GHG (greenhouse gases) and ETS (Emissions Trading System) allocations for all sites.
  • Carbon accounting uses Cerise as closely linked to Finance, which was heavily involved with Cerise implementation.
  • Cerise is not an SAP module, but custom solution in BW where master data is directly maintained in BW.  It uses BW outside of its original purpose of consolidating relevant business information from productive SAP applications.  
  • Currently solution only covers scope 1 and 2 at site level.  Scope 3 requirements with 15 subcategory e.g. GHG protocol 3.1 are not covered. 
  • Cerise is recent development without a formal RFI. 
  • New carbon accounting solution such as SAP Green Ledger needed to cover all categories, rather than a patchwork solution.
  • Current dashboard access is via Qkliksense, which is expected to be redundant with a new solution for carbon footprint management such as Green Ledger. 
  • Cerise supports requirements for annual disclosures as backbone for reporting Scope 1 and 2 relating to energy.  Some are essential for annual reports.  
  • Scope 1 data BW Cerise where activity is collected combined with emission factor for each plant.  Mapping table for each plant in BW.  
  • Qty of energies are reported from ERP directly.   Cerise is plant level, Syensqo are buying these energies and combining the emission factor. WP1 uses qty of energies in BOM .  Emission factor not from BOM, Cerise tool to get emission factor at plant level.
• Qliksense 
  • Dashboard for BW Cerise, integration not required if dashboard functionality available via SAP Green Ledger, potentially redundant with the new solution.
  • Used for SPM, which may remain valid with a new carbon footprint management solution. 
  • Qliksense used for reporting relating to CSRD for visualisation.

• EcotransIT (World)
  • The most widely used software worldwide for the automatic calculation of energy consumption, carbon emissions, air pollutants, and external costs.  
  • Widely used by peers and 3PL providers.  
  • Calculates distances based on the most logical routing and most likely mode of transport e.g. diesel-powered trains in US vs electric trains in Europe.
  • Contract not signed, yet, under negotiation.  
  • Database, no software. 
  • Should be in carbon accounting blue box middle.  Should be part of scope 3 transport related emissions. 
  • May be covered by Green ledger. Comprehensive tool should replace it.
• SPM
  • SPM is just methodology which will remain a custom solution, no appetite for vendors to change SPM.
  • Monetises carbon footprint and looks at the market regarding sustainability grading. 
  • It would be beneficial to be able to input carbon footprint data via SPM.  Eventually should be hard interface.
  • Integration should feed carbon footprint management to LCA tool, which should feed SPM.
• LCA tool
  • Should receive carbon footprint management data to forward to SPM tool
  • RFI for LCA space should be launched, sent out to vendors.  Proof of concept Q4 2024 before decision.  SAP will be invited.   
• Sigreen
  • Exchange platform sourcing PCF for raw material mapping.
  • Exchange tool managing requests from suppliers with exchange to customer. 
  • Customer connects to Sigreen for relevant data. 
  • Future interfaces should be API.
• PCF
  • Currently tool for managing PCF for Syensqo products.
  • Forwards data to Sigreen.   Customer connects to Sigreen for relevant data. 
  • Future interfaces should be API.
• PURE
  • Emissions reporting platform.
  • Survey and reporting tool (SERF reporting).
  • Annual survey to collect water and emissions KPIs.
  • Site results put in PURE.
  • PURE SERF contract under negotiation.  Current contract until April 2027 with the option of 3rd year extension.  Could be moved to Gensuite in the future.  
  • SAP EHS emissions module could potentially replace the need for PURE SERF or move to Gensuite.
• Gensuite
  • Directionally trying to position Gensuite no 1 industrial site application (accident reporting already moving)
  • PURE contract renegotiated now to be moved to Gensuite 
• Ecovadis
  • Supplier assessments as part of Procurement processes.
  • Supports evaluation and scoring in relation to responsible sourcing.
• SAP partners for SAP SFM emission factor management with ecoinvent and Carbon Minds, to provide LCA content through the SAP Store, allowing easy import into the application. Y

Data

Largely required from raw materials.  Needs request from suppliers, otherwise Syensqo has to rely on industry data. 

Dedicated project on carbon footprint

Managed by Philippe Chevaux (Sustainability DT) eg. estimation on product footprint. Project finish by end of 2024.  

Assumptions

Clearly describe the underlying assumptions which informed or limited the choices available, or impacted the decision: cost, schedule, regulatory requirements, business drivers, country footprint, technology, etc. Include links as necessary. This section is important because a future change in circumstances might invalidate some key assumptions, which then prompts a decision to be revisited. 

Implementation of related SAP functions, dependencies.

all SAP delivery require transportaton and are covered CO2 mgmt wise

Constraints

Capture any constraints or limitations inherent to the recommended option. This could be aspects which, if changed or removed in future, could cause the decision to be revisited or invalidated. For example, a constraint might be that a new product has significant gaps in important functionality, which caused an older alternative to be recommended. If those gaps are closed in future, this might cause the decision to be invalidated.

• This KDD covers the carbon footprint management only.  The creation of further KDDs may be required to cover other areas of Sustainability.
• Resource and time constraints are currently hindering to go beyond Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) whilst striving for Life Cycle Assessment (LCA).
• Product stewwardship cannot approach suppliers.
• This KDD covers the carbon footprint management only.  The creation of further KDDs may be required to cover other areas of Sustainability.
• Dependency on SAP RISE tbc
• This KDD covers the carbon footprint management only.  The creation of further KDDs may be required to cover other areas of Sustainability.

• The following areas of Sustainability footprint management for Syensqo are out of scope for this KDD:

  • Water management 
  • Energy management  
  • Land use 

Impacts

Describe the impact of the decision on other aspects such as other processes, infrastructure, other SAP modules or systems, data cleansing and migration, developments, automations, interfaces, in-flight projects, etc.

• Business continuity impact. 
• Reporting requirements? R2R integration
• Cerise very closely linked to Finance, which was heavily involved with Cerise implementation.  Good idea to move carbon footprint management into SAP as finance project.  Financial transactions are influenced by carbon emissions, which is also related to energy purchase and energy consumption.  Should be able to rely on financial transaction.   That is how Cerise was designed with transactional financial transactional flow.
•  Stakeholders should Procurement. 

• To incorporate calculated footprints from SAP SFM into your preferred analytical application, such as SAP Analytics Cloud or non-SAP solutions, an updated version of the OData API on SAP Business Accelerator Hub will be available soon. For future releases, we plan to provide simulation capabilities for various footprint scenarios and what-if analyses, enabling sensitivity analysis and comparison of product carbon footprints. This assists in sustainable decision-making regarding product design, production efficiency, and supply sourcing.

• first scenarios already available: In Purchasing, product footprints are integrated into Purchase Requisitions (PR). This allows approvers and operational purchasers to assess the environmental impact of PRs. The Monitor Purchase Requisition Items app provides insights into current and future emissions, enabling proactive optimization of the environmental footprint. Future releases plan to integrate footprints into Purchase Orders as well.

• Another integration of footprints is available in Inventory Management, starting with the Stock - Multiple Materials app to provide insights into the environmental impact of stocks. Previously used for stock quantities and financial values, the app now allows for sustainability criteria in decision-making processes. 

• Carbon footprints are also available in SAP Integrated Business Planning (IBP), enabling users to track greenhouse gas emissions according to supply planning heuristic results. Furthermore, we delivered the first data exchange use case leveraging the SAP Business Network, by integrating footprints into Logistic Business Network – Material Traceability (LBN-MT). Much more is planned to publish product footprints into networks and portals, for improved customer relationships, streamlined processes, and better information transparency. Additionally, an integration with SAP Sustainability Control Tower is planned as well, allowing holistic steering and reporting of emissions data linked to specific business operations.

  
  

Business Rules

The decision may translate into business rules which enforce the decision and will require configuration. List these business rules here. For example, "An Outline Agreement cannot be created via the RFQ process. An awarded RFQ can only result in a Purchase Order". 

Options considered

List the options (viable options or alternatives) you considered. These often require a longer explanation with diagrams, or references to other documents (links are best, but attachments are also possible). Use enough detail to adequately explain what you considered so that a project or business stakeholder reviewing this decision will not come back and ask "did you think about...?"; this leads to loss of credibility and questioning of other decisions. This section also helps ensure that you considered enough suitable alternatives rather than just copy/pasting SAP's recommendations.

Option A: Continue As Is

Decribe the option in sufficient detail for a reader familiar with the subject matter to understand it properly

• Lack of integration with S/4HANA.
• Large variety of non-SAP tools.
• Lack of granularity.
• Lack of system and data integrity.
• Not future-proof.

Option B:  SAP Green Ledger only - separate/delay?

Decribe the option in sufficient detail for a reader familiar with the subject matter to understand it properly

Combines financial and environmental data to enable deep insights and effective decision making at different points across the business process.

Business decisions need to consider environmental costs.  The Green Ledger allows for thses costs to become visible up front. 

Makes it easier for businesses to accurately account for the carbon they produce across their value chain. Given the fact that SAP handles 70% of the world’s business transactions, it will also – when it launches next year – be the largest solution of its kind available.

“To truly make progress and create a more sustainable world, it’s important that enterprises take action on the carbon they’re producing,” explains Jesper Schleimann, SAP’s Chief Strategy and Innovation Officer. “But the only way to do that is to have actual data so they can make business decisions.”

Couple the need for action with an increased need for transparency from investors, employees, regulatory bodies, and customers, enterprises are being pushed to make sustainability an integral part of their business blueprint.

available within the RISE and GROW with SAP programmes.

By adding in the fourth element, the Green Ledger, businesses will be able to act on the insight they have in front of them.

“Of course, you can take action at any stage but the Green Ledger will help to make bigger, bolder, decisions that become integral to what a business does; embedded across the enterprise.”

Just as financial ledgers detail the value that moves across an enterprise – how much money has been made, where it should be invested – with the Green Ledger, businesses will know which activities are driving their carbon footprint so they can look at where and how they can reduce it and make better decisions.

Option C:  SAP Sustainability Footprint Management (SFM) only

Decribe the option in sufficient detail for a reader familiar with the subject matter to understand it properly

SAP solutions to calculate and manage the full range of corporate, value chain and product-level GHG emissions.  It presents a future-proof solution for transactional carbon accounting to enable more precise and granular tracking of emissions across business operations and supply chains.

By embedding sustainability data into core business processes through ERP, executives can achieve a holistic, enterprise-wide performance capability.

SAP Sustainability Footprint Management: A solution to calculate and manage carbon flows across GHG Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions, integrating with SAP S/4HANA for accurate and efficient emissions calculations.  SAP SFM tracks what’s flowing in and out of the business, such as the actual footprint of a product, the materials used to produce it, the packaging, and the transportation.  Footprint Management collects that data, maps it out, and gives an overview of what’s really driving impact at a much more granular level.

Carbon footprint management was briefly investigated by Syensqo about three years ago and disregarded whilst SAP was still in the development phase for this solution.

SFM provides you with the full picture of your carbon footprint and enables you to Record, Report, and Act to decarbonize your value chain. The calculations integrate supplier data and existing ERP business data – dramatically improving the speed, accuracy, and efficiency of emissions calculation and management.

Summary of the key benefits:

• RECORD: Easily leverage existing data with seamless integration and automation – Seamlessly integrate data from SAP S/4HANA, 3rd party data, supplier data, and facility energy flows for data acquisition and footprint distribution.

• REPORT: Get auditable corporate and product carbon footprints at scale – Assess your sustainability footprint with granular cradle to gate carbon footprint calculations that consider materials, transportation, and production.

• ACT: Decarbonize along business processes through granular transparency – Act on your reduction targets with carbon accounting software that supports Scope 1, 2 and 3 transparency and generates analytical insights from footprint data.

SAP Solution

Product Capabilities

The capabilities of SAP Sustainability Footprint Management can be broken down into five major steps along your footprint journey: You start with acquiring master and transactional data from your connected business system, then you combine those data with emission factors to evaluate the environmental impact. Based on that, the application is calculating the sustainability footprints. Afterwards the calculated footprints can be analyzed in detail, and they can be integrated back into connected business systems. The capabilities and footprint journey, and what is already available with the current release, are visualized in this metro map:

Data Acquisition

SAP Sustainability Footprint Management offers various options to reuse ERP data, including master data and transactional activity data (material movements). It integrates with SAP S/4HANA Cloud and SAP S/4HANA (2021 and later) out-of-the-box, while other ERP systems can be connected via Public APIs. An IT project is needed for this integration, with SAP Services support available. Additionally, data can be imported via flat-file uploads using templates. Freight-transport specific master data entities like plant or supplier locations can be imported via file upload. The system further offers a starter package, including location information for various transportation hubs and vehicle data for different transport modes.

We plan to enhance the SAP S/4HANA integration in future releases, including replicating product cost estimates for footprint calculations and reusing master data in freight transport calculations. Further, we plan an integration with SAP EHS Environment Management for incorporating GHG emissions calculations, and connections to Business Networks like SAP Ariba and Catena-X for data collection and sharing, supporting the PACT-Standard.

Emission Factors Management

After importing business data from your ERP system, SAP Sustainability Footprint Management helps evaluate the environmental impact of this data by importing and managing emission factors. Today, we’re focusing on climate change impact through Global Warming Potential (GWP) in CO2-equivalents (CO2e). The plan is to extend to other impact categories, like water or land use in the future. Emission factors can be imported via Excel-file from primary sources, representing actual data directly from your suppliers, or secondary sources, such as lifecycle assessment (LCA) databases, representing industry averages. SAP partners with ecoinvent and Carbon Minds, to provide LCA content through the SAP Store, allowing easy import into the application. You can further utilize custom data from your operations or LCA software tools or use estimated proxies for specific materials or activities. To support the move from average to actual footprint calculation we plan to launch an API for sharing product footprints along the value chain, adhering to global standards like the World Business Council for Sustainable Development's Partnership for Carbon Transparency (WBCSD PACT) and the Together for Sustainability (TfS) initiative. This will provide direct access to supplier footprints, simplifying the mapping process and improving data quality with primary data. We further plan to integrate with SAP Sustainability Data Exchange to leverage its carbon sharing capabilities.

The application further provides a functionality to map emission factors to your purchased products, based on your imported ERP data, at different granularity. It auto-generates a mapping template with prefilled information like products, commodity codes, and suppliers. You can edit this template in-app or via a CSV file, and associate emission factors to each item via filtering and searching your imported emission factor databases for the best match. For improving this process, we plan to introduce automated mapping recommendations, a mapping wizard with validation checks, and an API for external providers. These improvements aim to boost user experience and automation. Our goal is to achieve intelligent emission factor mapping using AI technology, allowing automatic and transparent mapping.

Footprint Calculation

Our goal for SAP Sustainability Footprint Management is to address the entire product lifecycle – from cradle to grave. With the current release, we’re already covering cradle-to-gate, therefore including upstream emissions from material acquisition & pre-processing and transport, as well as direct emissions related to own production activities. We plan to include downstream emissions (product use and end-of-life) in future releases. Reflected on the corporate footprint, we’re covering the corresponding GHG Scope 1, 2, and 3 categories related to material, freight transport, and facilities. More Scope 3 categories associated to downstream emissions and people transport are planned for future releases.
You can maintain individual inventory scopes in the system to define the organizational boundaries of the footprint calculation, including companies, plants, and value chain steps. The application uses energy flow models to connect energy-related elements with the resources replicated from the ERP system. This includes energy carriers, energy sources, resources (e.g., assembly line or oven), and infrastructure (meters, process infrastructure, and facilities). These elements can be fully modeled and updated, allowing for the creation of models using a list display or a graphical flow modeler with drag-and-drop functionality:

Energy Flow Model:

 When a direct energy flow connection is unavailable, you can set allocation rules to distribute emissions to products and GHG Scopes and Categories. Currently, fixed factors are used for distribution, but further automation - e.g., based on product mass - is planned for future releases.

SAP Sustainability Footprint Management calculates a company's total carbon footprint and attributes emissions to products and corporate overhead, aiming to achieve a balanced emission level throughout all production stages. Two methods are provided: Calculating Organizational Footprint Inventories, which considers GHG Protocol Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions and requires input data like energy bills, meter readings, and manual emissions. It’s leveraging the imported master and transactional activity data, the mapped emission factors, as well as the energy flow model and allocation rules that have been set up previously, to calculate the footprints. The second option is Calculating Product Footprints, which provides insights into a plant's product footprints by uploading a Bill of Material (BOM)-like Excel file. The calculated footprints can be monitored in an easy-to-read graphical format with drill-down possibilities into main emission drivers. A Sankey Diagram is the core tool for investigating emission results, offering transparency on input factors, such as purchased energy. You can explore various levels of detail, including calculation data and formulas, to understand the carbon footprint emissions. The app allows publishing results to connected SAP S/4HANA Cloud or SAP S/4HANA systems.

Sankey-Diagram - Management and monitoring of footprint results:

The calculation of inbound and outbound transport footprints is done by uploading CSV files, containing transport information. The application uses client-specific routes or automated calculation logic based on distances to determine emissions. Data is validated, and feedback is provided for any issues. We plan to include calculated transport footprints in organizational footprint inventories and overall product footprints in future releases, and further plan to reuse the replicated ERP data for the calculation itself. The Calculate Transport Footprints - Lite app enables quick calculations and assessments for single shipments without importing data, with results visualized in charts, tables, and maps. This allows you to quickly compare emissions related to different transport mode choices (e.g. plane vs. train) and helps your company to make informed decisions on how to reduce your transport related carbon footprint.

Footprint Analytics

For analyzing the calculated footprints and gaining new insights, SAP Sustainability Footprint Management offers built-in analytics. With various dashboards you can analyze your corporate balance with all emission inflows and outflows, as well as your emissions per purchased and sold products and energy consumers. You can also drill down into emissions by GHG scope, category, and energy source, and view trends.

For transport footprints, there are own dynamic dashboards available with highly customizable charts and detailed reports on various transport relevant KPIs. You can also visualize and analyze inbound & outbound transport flows and emissions on a world map, including a heatmap to display emission hotspots.

To incorporate calculated footprints into your preferred analytical application, such as SAP Analytics Cloud or non-SAP solutions, an updated version of the OData API on SAP Business Accelerator Hub will be available soon. For future releases, we plan to provide simulation capabilities for various footprint scenarios and what-if analyses, enabling sensitivity analysis and comparison of product carbon footprints. This assists in sustainable decision-making regarding product design, production efficiency, and supply sourcing.

Footprint Integration

Last, but certainly not the least capability is integrating the calculated footprints into the end-to-end business processes, providing transparency and insights into sustainability metrics for not only sustainability experts in central sustainability departments but all business users in the company and its respective lines of business. From SAP Sustainability Footprint Management, the footprints can be published into the connected SAP S/4HANA Cloud or SAP S/4HANA (2021 and later) system to make the information accessible to users, enabling them to incorporate these criteria into their decision-making processes. To integrate footprints into business processes, Key User Extensibility can be used. Over time, we plan to integrate footprints natively into more SAP S/4HANA applications and processes, with first scenarios already available: In Purchasing, product footprints are integrated into Purchase Requisitions (PR). This allows approvers and operational purchasers to assess the environmental impact of PRs. The Monitor Purchase Requisition Items app provides insights into current and future emissions, enabling proactive optimization of the environmental footprint. Future releases plan to integrate footprints into Purchase Orders as well. Another integration of footprints is available in Inventory Management, starting with the Stock - Multiple Materials app to provide insights into the environmental impact of stocks. Previously used for stock quantities and financial values, the app now allows for sustainability criteria in decision-making processes.

Footprints in S/4HANA Monitor Purchase Requsition App:

Carbon footprints are also available in SAP Integrated Business Planning (IBP), enabling users to track greenhouse gas emissions according to supply planning heuristic results. Furthermore, we delivered the first data exchange use case leveraging the SAP Business Network, by integrating footprints into Logistic Business Network – Material Traceability (LBN-MT). Much more is planned to publish product footprints into networks and portals, for improved customer relationships, streamlined processes, and better information transparency. Additionally, an integration with SAP Sustainability Control Tower is planned as well, allowing holistic steering and reporting of emissions data linked to specific business operations.

Business Architecture

SAP Sustainability Footprint Management - Simplified Business Architecture (subject to change):

SAP Sustainability Footprint Management is a cloud application that is built on the SAP Business Technology Platform. In the application, you manage the import of data to call the Data Extractor in the Sustainability Integration Component in ABAP. This reuse component is included in SAP S/4HANA and pulls the relevant business and master data from your SAP S/4HANA Cloud or SAP S/4HANA system and sends the aggregated data back. Alternatively, APIs can be leveraged to import data from ECC or other ERP sources, and data can further be imported via file upload. Emission Factors from own or third-party databases can be imported via file upload as well. For future releases, we further plan an integration with SAP S/4HANA EHS Environment Management for leveraging GHG Scope 1 & 2 emission as well as waste data. We also plan an integration with the Business Networks and SAP Sustainability Data Exchange for collecting primary and actual footprint data from suppliers.

Based on the extracted and imported data, you define the inventory scope, mappings, energy flow models, allocations, and derivations. Consequently, the footprint calculation can be initiated. The calculated footprints are stored in the Footprint Inventory and can be viewed and monitored.

Via the Sustainability Integration Component, the Footprint Inventory is also connected back to your SAP S/4HANA Cloud and SAP S/4HANA system, so that your business users can access the footprints directly in their end-to-end processes and applications. In the future, we plan to deliver holistic steering and analytics capabilities by connecting SAP Sustainability Footprint Management and its Footprint Inventory to SAP Sustainability Control Tower. Further, an integration of the footprints into the Business Networks and SAP Sustainability Data Exchange is planned, as well as Public APIs to connect to third-party applications for analytics, disclosure, or other purposes. In the next days, an updated version of the existing Analytical API will be available to integrate the calculated footprints into any analytical application of your choice.

Road Map

For bringing SAP’s sustainability portfolio closer together, we plan an integration into SAP Sustainability Control Tower for including product and corporate footprints in companywide holistic steering and reporting. The planned integration with EHS Environment Management enables the incorporation and allocation of calculated GHG Scope 1 & 2 emissions into the footprint calculation. For collecting and managing Emission Factors, we plan enhancements and further automation of the current mapping. To support the next steps in transactional carbon accounting, we plan inbound and outbound integration options for collecting supplier-specific product footprint data and for sharing calculated footprints with customers – supporting common standards like PACT. This also includes the integration with SAP Sustainability Data Exchange. For extending the product and value chain calculations to the entire lifecycle – from Cradle-to-Grave – we plan to include the calculation of downstream emissions (product use and end-of-life). Further, we plan to extend the GHG Scope 3 to also cover people transportation (business travel and employee commuting). For simulating and modeling alternative scenarios we plan to provide simulation capabilities, such as what-if analyses.

Integration Scenarios

• Reuse existing ERP data: Reuse of existing ERP data for calculation and embed footprint results back into business processes to influence decision-making.
• Reuse existing business data, structures, and logic from SAP S/4HANA Cloud and import transactional activity data for your footprint calculation (e.g. material movements) and connect any ERP system via public APIs.
• Integrate results into business processes: Help drive sustainable business decisions by embedding footprint results into business processes, like supply chain planning or sourcing and procurement, via direct integration
• Leverage full sustainability portfolio:  Make use of our holistic sustainability portfolio through direct integrations with SAP Sustainability Control Tower, SAP Sustainability Data Exchange, and SAP S/4HANA Cloud for EHS environment management.
• SAP Roadmap for 2025 includes footprint breakdown for fossil and biogenic emissions product footprints.  

Emission Factor Management

• Increase accuracy with emission factor mapping powered by AI and include supplier specific footprints
• Map emission factors with AI:  Use SAP Business AI to automate the mapping of emission factors to ERP data to minimise manual effort and enhance the accuracy of result.
• Include actual supplier data:  Increase the share of primary data by directly importing footprints from your suppliers. Leverage the integration with SAP Sustainability Data Exchange (PACT V2) or use direct entry, file upload, and push API.
• Use lifecycle assessment (LCA) data:  Use industry averages from third-party content providers, upload your own data packages, or use preconfigured data packages (e.g. EPA, GLEC) for maximum flexibility and consistency status.

Carbon Footprint Calculation at scale

• Calculate and manage Scope 1, 2, and 3 corporate, value-chain, and product footprint data.
• Calculate product and corporate carbon footprint:  Calculate footprints on product and corporate level at scale by integrating transactional and master data using flexible calculation methods.
• Model energy flows and allocations:  Model energy flows per energy carrier and resource in your production line or facility to allocate energy consumption and assign emissions to manufactured products.
• Manage footprint inventory scopes:  Maintain individual inventory scopes to define the organisational boundaries of the footprint calculation. Define and list all data sources to be used for the calculation and monitor its progress.
•  

Carbon Footprint Analytics

• Gain full transparency into your carbon footprint data across your entire value
  chain on a granular level.
• Dashboards with granular breakdowns showing carbon footprints across all GHG-P scopes, providing analysis of hotspots and various breakdowns.
• Advanced transport visualisation allowing to analyse and visualise all inbound and outbound transport routes and legs and respective emissions on various charts and a word map.
• Integrate footprint data into analytical application via APIs .

integration with SAP sustainability solutions e.g. SAP Product Footprint Management (PFM)

Transportation Management (TM) allows you to calculate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions during manual planning and vehicle scheduling and routing (VSR) optimization.  It is possible to specify carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions per weight and distance unit for your trucks. These CO₂ emissions are taken into account during manual and automatic planning and displayed in road freight orders.

Option D: SAP EHS Environment Management only

Decribe the option in sufficient detail for a reader familiar with the subject matter to understand it properly

• Waste Management (separate KDD)
• Emissions Management (EM)
  • Manage all types of emissions resulting from operation to fulfill legal requirements e.g.
    • hazardous air pollutants
    • criteria polluatans (NOx and SOx)
    • greenhouse gases (GHG)
    • air or water emissions
  • Calculate and aggregate emissions through data transparency and monitoring
  • Improve calculation accuracy and transparency
• GHG Emissions Management
• Water/Wastewater Management

It tracks all aspects of environmental impacts allowing an auditable process for calculations emissions.  

SAP plan to enhance the SAP S/4HANA integration in future releases, including replicating product cost estimates for footprint calculations and reusing master data in freight transport calculations. Further, we plan an integration with SAP EHS Environment Management for incorporating GHG emissions calculations, and connections to Business Networks like SAP Ariba and Catena-X for data collection and sharing, supporting the PACT-Standard.

Capabilities:

• Many options for collecting data and sampling to be used for compliance tracking and emission calculations.
• Built-in equitations and content driving a flexible and auditable calculator for hazardous air pollutant and GHG emissions inventories.
• Emissions forecasting tools
• Realtime and analytical tools and support for ESG and sustainability reporting

Benefits: 

• Reduced risk of non-compliance and penalties
• Reduced effort to calculate emission totals
• Improved calculation accuracy and transparency
• Long term dependability
• Integration

SAP Roadmap:

Option E:  SAP Sustainability Footprint Management (SFM) and SAP EHS Emissions Management - combination

• SAP plan to enhance the SAP S/4HANA integration in future releases, including replicating product cost estimates for footprint calculations and reusing master data in freight transport calculations. Further, we plan an integration with SAP EHS Environment Management for incorporating GHG emissions calculations, and connections to Business Networks like SAP Ariba and Catena-X for data collection and sharing, supporting the PACT-Standard.

• SAP SFM Carbon footprints are also available in SAP Integrated Business Planning (IBP), enabling users to track greenhouse gas emissions according to supply planning heuristic results. Furthermore, we delivered the first data exchange use case leveraging the SAP Business Network, by integrating footprints into Logistic Business Network – Material Traceability (LBN-MT). Much more is planned to publish product footprints into networks and portals, for improved customer relationships, streamlined processes, and better information transparency. Additionally, an integration with SAP Sustainability Control Tower is planned as well, allowing holistic steering and reporting of emissions data linked to specific business operations.

  
  

Evaluation

Outline why you selected a position. The best format could be a pro/con table (sample below), but is up to you as the author. You must consider complexity, feasibility, cost/effort to implement, but also ongoing operational impact and cost. You must consider the program principles and explain any deviations in detail. This is probably as important as the decision itself.

	Option A - SAP Green Ledger	Option B - As Is	Option C	Option D
Compliance	Pro Harmonise current ESG landscape. Con	Pro Pro	Pro Con	Pro Con
Integration	Pro Qliksense as dashboard for carbon footprint would be redundant Con	Con	Pro Pro	Con Con
Business Impact	Pro	Con	Con	Pro

See also

Insert links and references to other documents which are relevant when trying to understand this decision and its implications. Other decisions are often impacted, so it's good to list them here with links. Attachments are also possible but dangerous as they are static documents and not updated by their authors.

2023cSyensqo Annual Integrated Report

McKinnon Report

Change log

Workflow history