Assigning factors

You can specify whether to use effective dates, published dates, or both when you assign factors.

In IBM® ESG Suite, factors are used to calculate sustainability metrics, such emissions and energy, and in conversions, such as mass and volume. A factor is selected based on a hierarchy of criteria, which include factor set, data type, sub type, effective dates, and published dates.

Many environmental agencies, such as US EPA, IEA, and DEFRA, publish factors years after the factors are effective. The time lag is typically two years. For example, an agency might publish factors in 2024 that are based on activity data from 2022.

In Envizi ESG Suite, two sets of dates are stored for each emission factor; effective dates and published dates.

The following methods can be used in Envizi ESG Suite to assign factors.

Use effective and published dates: Use effective dates for historical factors and switch to published dates on a specific date, which is known as the historical load date.; When an organization on-boards with Envizi ESG Suite, it loads historical data into the platform. For historical data, organizations typically apply factors based on effective dates. An organization can then decide the point in time at which their data switches from using the effective dates of an emission factor to the published dates.
Use published dates only: Use the latest available factors in factor calculations. Reporting relies on the published dates of the factor set. This method is the recommended method.
IBM Envizi recommends using published dates only. Although using effective dates only provides the greatest alignment of emissions calculations to the underlying data used to calculate emission factors, it leaves client emission data open to recalculation.
Use effective dates only: Use the factors that were available at the time the activity occurred. Reporting relies on the effective dates of the factor set. If you use effective dates solely, your calculations that rely on factors, for example, emissions, are recalculated to use factors based on effective dates when new factors are published.
Using effective dates is only recommended if your organization performance external emission reporting and your organization is moving from a system where effective dates were used. This scenario is not common and most organizations are already on a system where published dates are used.

Important: Your system administrator configures which date options IBM Envizi will use to calculate emissions by modifying the internal Historical data load setting.

The following behavior exists when a value is set by your system administrator:

If the value is blank, effective dates are used.
If the value is set, emissions before the data will calculate using the effective dates, and after will use published dates.
To use published dates only, the date should be set to a time before any client data exists.

Once the Historical data load value has been set, it should not be changed. Changing this setting will recalculate emissions.

Example

In October 2019, a company called ACME on-boarded with Envizi ESG Suite. ACME wants to use effective dates for historical data and published dates for activity data outside of the historical period. History data spans from January 2014 to March 2019. March 2019 represents the end of the historical period.

Table 1 displays the factors that are currently available, as of October 2019.

Table 1. Factors published by Oct 2019
	Factor	Effective from	Effective to	Published from	Published to
A	0.6		December 2014		June 2017
B	0.7	January 2015	December 2016	July 2017	June 2018
C	0.8	January 2016	December 2017	July 2018	June 2019
D	0.9	January 2017	December 2018	July 2019	June 2020

In October 2019, when ACME on-boards with Envizi ESG Suite, factors A, B, C, And D are published. However, only factors A, B, and C have effective dates that are aligned with the historic period, which is up to March 2019. Factor D was published in July 2019, which is later than March 2019, so its effective dates do not apply.

Period 1 in this example is from January 2014 to February 2016 and uses effective dates.
Period 1:

2014 uses 0.6 (A)
2015 uses 0.7 (B)
2016 uses 0.8 (C)

The next period to consider is period 2 from March 2017 to March 2019, which is the switchover date to the historical load date. It uses published dates.
Period 2

2017 = 0.8 (C)
2018 = 0.8 (C)

As shown in the example, for a short time, the factor value does not change until the switchover. The next factor is published in the sequence, which happens in July 2019. Only after July 2019 is the factor published and available use for the organization.

The final period is the period after the switch-over date. It uses published dates.
Period 3:

2019 uses 0.9 (D)

From October 2019 onwards, ACME assigns factors to activity data based on published dates.