Stories from SHAPE: How the DDSM project demonstrated that environmental impact calculation can be automated
How much energy went into producing this product? Which part of production generated the most waste? Where are the emissions actually coming from? Companies collect a wide range of data. However, if the figures they are working with are mostly estimates rather than operational data, it becomes difficult to measure and improve sustainability efforts.
This was the starting point for SHAPE’s first project, Data-driven Sustainability Management (DDSM), coordinated by Åbo Akademi University (ÅAU).
"With DDSM, we wanted to get closer to real sustainability data," says Jerker Björkqvist, Professor and subject cluster leader in Information Technology. To illustrate, he points at a coffee mug.
"This mug consists of raw materials, and a certain amount of energy went into producing it. With the right data, I can tell you exactly what this mug's footprint on the world is."
However, it is rarely that simple. Estimates are often used in place of the real thing.
The data needed to calculate a product's environmental footprint typically sits across separate systems and connecting these is not always straightforward. In addition, raw materials often arrive in bulk from suppliers with only a fraction going into a single unit, making it even more complex to calculate an accurate footprint at product level.
"There are a lot of complications," Björkqvist says, "but you can get much closer to the true impact than what many companies arrive at today."
Calculating a product's environmental impact
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a standard method for measuring the environmental impact of a product across its lifecycle. A concept for automating LCA calculations was a concrete outcome from the DDSM project.
Researchers at ÅAU built a solution that collects live data directly from the production line. Sensors track what goes into the production process, such as raw materials and energy, and the system matches it LCA reference databases.
The system then calculates the lifecycle impact without anyone having to manually gather, clean, or compile the data. What previously required significant manual effort becomes, in principle, continuous and automatic.
The devil, as Björkqvist puts it, is in the details. For automation to be useful in daily operations, it must be robust. This concept demonstrated that automated LCA calculations are technically feasible, however, implementing it into daily operations is a different challenge.
"It's like a mountain," Björkqvist says. "You can't just think you'll sprint to the top. You need to do it in steps."
What happens when companies and universities sit at the same table?
Companies and universities operate on different horizons. Björkqvist describes how companies often need to point to an ROI to justify investments into new methods or technologies, while universities have the mandate to investigate questions that don't yet have a proven answer.
Business Finland bridges that gap, funding projects like DDSM to enable companies and researchers to develop new knowledge together.
The result is a symbiosis. Researchers investigate which technologies are worth developing, which methodologies apply, and what the business potential looks like.
The knowledge produced doesn't belong to a single company but benefits all project partners. In an ecosystem, you also quickly get access to varied competencies and perspectives that wouldn't usually be in the same room.
"You sit around the same table with different roles, but you're heading in the same direction," he says.
"The true value of an ecosystem is that you suddenly get flashes of insight on how to solve things you wouldn't have reached alone,” Björkqvist concludes. “Many brains are always better than one."