Frequently Asked Questions

The year 2024 marks a decisive turning point for companies in sustainability reporting. The CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive) will significantly expand the existing requirements for non-financial reporting. All companies established in the EU (with the exception of micro-enterprises) will be covered by the new reporting obligation. In addition, all non-capital market-oriented companies are subject to the CSRD if they fulfil two of the following three criteria:

– Balance sheet total > 25 million euros
– Net sales > 50 million euros
– Number of employees > 250

This means that around 50,000 companies in the EU are affected by the directive, around 15,000 in Germany alone.

The CSRD also applies to companies outside the EU with a turnover of at least 150 million euros in the EU whose subsidiaries fulfil the above criteria or whose branches achieve a turnover of more than 50 million euros annually.

The aim of the CSRD is to increase the accountability of European companies with regard to sustainability aspects and to introduce binding reporting standards at EU level with the ESRS (European Sustainability Reporting Standards). The establishment of indicators in the areas of environment, social and governance ensures better quantification of reported data and content and is also intended to improve the measurability and comparability of the provided information.

In order to make it easier for stakeholders such as banks and investors to access sustainability information, sustainability reporting is to become a mandatory part of the financial management report in the future. In this way, the EU wants to gradually provide sustainability reporting with the same status as traditional financial reporting.

To ensure the credibility and reliability of the published information and to prove that it fulfils the requirements of the directive, sustainability reporting, like financial reporting, must be audited by an independent external body.

The ESRS specify the content that companies must provide in their sustainability report in accordance with the CSRD. The aim is to ensure the comprehensibility, relevance, verifiability and comparability of sustainability information.

The ESRS are specifically adapted to the requirements of the CSRD and must be applied by all companies subject to reporting requirements.

The ESRS currently consist of Set 1 with the first 12 ESRS categories, which are divided into the following groups:

1. General standards
   ESRS 1 General requirements
   ESRS 2 General disclosures
2. Environmental Standards
   ESRS E1 Climate change
   ESRS E2 Pollution
   ESRS E3 Water and marine resources
   ESRS E4 Biodiversity and ecosystems
   ESRS E5 Resource utilisation and circular economy
3. Social standards
   ESRS S1 Own labour force
   ESRS S2 Labour in the value chain
   ESRS S3 Affected communities
   ESRS S4 Consumers and end users
4. Governance standards
   ESRS G1 Corporate policy

Within the 12 groups, the information and data relevant for reporting is requested in over 1000 data points. Some of the information is mandatory (826 data points) and some is optional (257).

Which ESRS and data points are actually used in a company’s reporting is determined in advance by means of a materiality analysis. This determines whether the aspects to be analysed are classified as material in terms of the opportunities and risks for the company and/or the impact of its business activities on the environment.

In addition to the CSRD, the EU Taxonomy Regulation is another core element of the EU Green Deal. The EU Taxonomy introduced a standardised classification system for environmentally sustainable business practices, which serves as a guide for investors, banks and other institutions when allocating resources to sustainable investments.

The regulation obliges certain companies to provide information on the extent to which their turnover, operating expenditure (OpEx) and capital expenditure (CapEx) relate to the six environmental targets defined in the EU taxonomy:

1. Climate change mitigation
2. Climate change adaptation
3. Sustainable use and protection of water and marine resources
4. Transition to a circular economy
5. Prevention and reduction of pollution
6. Protection and restoration of biodiversity and ecosystems

What information must companies disclose?

Companies that are subject to the EU-Taxonomy reporting obligation must disclose three KPIs in particular in relation to their economic activities:

• Proportion of taxonomy-compliant revenue vs. total revenue
• Proportion of taxonomy-compliant operating expenses vs. total operating expenses
• Share of taxonomy-compliant capital expenditure vs. total capital expenditure

In order for the turnover, CapEx and OpEx associated with an economic activity to be classified as sustainable in accordance with the EU taxonomy, the economic activity must fulfil the following 3 criteria:

• It must make a significant contribution to one of the above 6 environmental objectives
• It must not cause significant harm to any of the other five environmental objectives (DNSH / Do No Significant Harm criterion)
• It must not violate minimum social standards (Minimum Safeguards)

Which companies are subject to the EU-Taxonomy reporting obligation?

In principle, all companies that fall under the Non-Financial Reporting Directive (NFRD) are also obliged to disclose information on the conformity of their economic activities with the EU Taxonomy. Financial market players and corporations with more than 500 employees and a balance sheet total of more than EUR 25 million or a turnover of more than EUR 50 million are required to report. The group of companies subject to the reporting obligation will be successively expanded over the next few years.

The multi-award-winning Sustainability Management Platform (SMP) is a software tool that supports companies in managing their sustainability and reporting their key sustainability indicators. The TÜV-certified calculation of CO₂ emissions, for example, creates transparency and enables companies to measure and reduce the negative impact of their economic activities on the environment and society and to report their sustainability efforts to stakeholders such as investors, banks, authorities, customers or business partners. Effective sustainability measures for companies can be derived from the comprehensive analyses based on real data in the SMP Dashboard. The tool can also calculate intermodal transport chains (truck, ship, train, plane) and the corporate carbon footprint of office- and production sites in Scope 1-3 of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol.

The tool can also be used to fulfill EU reporting requirements with regards to the CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive) and EU-Taxonomy.

The aim of the platform is to enable the calculation, management and reporting of relevant ESG indicators in ONE platform and to make the sustainability impact of a company’s economic activities transparent and manageable, thus enabling a circular economy in the long term.

Data on the CO₂ footprint is becoming increasingly interesting and important for companies and stakeholders. But what is actually behind the CO₂ footprint, especially in the transport sector? The so-called carbon footprint shows the total amount of CO₂ emissions caused by the economic activities of a company and actors in the supply chain like the transport of goods and people. All greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions consisting of defined climate-relevant gases are converted into CO₂ equivalent values. In addition to the direct emissions caused by e. g. a transport medium, indirect emissions, e.g. from the fuel supply chain, are also included.

Today, the reporting of emissions is not only required by many participants in the international trade, but is also imposed by laws such as the Supply Chain Act and directives such as the CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive) in combination with the EU-Taxonomy, or proactively driven forward by a company’s own sustainability management and corresponding measures. In many countries, companies above a certain size are already obliged to prepare sustainability reports and publish information on the impact of their business activities on the environment, society and their governance.

The use of the SMP therefore offers many advantages:

• • Those who use SMP to support a more sustainable business orientation, can increase their energy efficiency, save fuel, CO₂ and therefore money. Recent research by Solistica (2019) found that sustainability measures can also improve a company’s net income by up to 8%.
  • Prices for energy and CO₂ emissions will continue to rise, EU climate targets were tightened again and laws such as the Supply Chain Act in Germany came into force in January 2023 and CSRD in January 2024. With the SMP, a company is ideally positioned to meet future sustainability challenges and reporting requirements.
  • Customers in the transport sector now choose their transport company not only according to the criteria of “price” and “transit time”, but also according to how sustainably the transport and logistics company operates.
  • More and more consumers are attaching importance to sustainability and the careful use of resources and are also demanding this from companies. Thanks to TÜV-certified calculations, the SMP serves as pathfinder and enabler for companies to present themselves credibly and verifiably as a sustainable player in their external image as well.
  • Compliance: The use of the SMP is safe and covers all current standards.

The modular SMP calculates greenhouse gas emissions, e. g. for the corporate carbon footprint, according to the Greenhouse Gas Protocol in Scopes 1-3. The calculation of transport emissions is based on the internationally recognized industry methodology of the Global Logistics Emission Council (GLEC Framework V.3), as well as the DIN norm ISO 14083. If no primary data is available, clients receive an estimate of their emissions based on representative industry averages or a value for the emissions of their specific fleet.
The data import is carried out in a legally secure and GDPR-compliant anonymized manner either automatically via an interface (API) or by manual upload.

The “Sustainable Transport” module can calculate intermodal transports for trucks, trains, planes and ships in accordance with GLEC V3 and ISO 14083. The “Scenario Analysis” function can be used to determine the transport route with the lowest emission value for the pre carriage, main carriage and on carriage and the results can be displayed in easy to understand dashboards. The methodology on which the module’s calculations are based has been tested and verified by TÜV Rheinland.

In the “Sustainable Company” module, the corporate carbon footprint (CCF) of company- and production sites is calculated in the different categories of Scopes 1-3 of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol. The methodology used for the calculations has been tested and verified by TÜV Rheinland.

In the “TAXONOFY” module, companies can determine their EU-Taxonomy eligibility and EU-Taxonomy alignment and report the results to the required stakeholders like auditors, investors or banks.

The calculation in the “Sustainable Transport” module distinguishes between carrier and freight payer. For the carrier sector, the following data is determined for the emission calculation:

• • • Days traveled
    • Vehicles driven
    • Kilometers driven
    • Number of tours
    • Number of legs
    • Percentage of empty trips
    • Empty kilometers driven
    • Emissions in total and by tours, legs and vehicles

The following data are determined in the freight payer area:

• • • Number of shipments
    • Weight
    • Kilometers traveled
    • Emissions by shipments and consignees

Vehicle data

• • • • Vehicle ID
      • Location
      •  Vehicle type
      •  Permissible total weight
      • Fuel type
      •  Year of construction

Trailer data

• • • • Trailer ID
      • Trailer type

Tour data

• • • •  Tour ID
      • Leg ID
      • Shipment ID
      • Shipment weight
      • Postal code and country of the stage location

The more detailed the data, the more accurate emission calculations can be provided.

The data can either be imported fully automated via an interface (API) to our clients’ IT landscape (ERP, TMS etc.), semi-automated via a mapping function or be entered manually.

Data in the SMP is secured in a GDPR-compliant manner. The connections and access to the platform are also SSL-encrypted.

The SMP modules „Sustainable Transport“ and „Sustainable Companies“ are suitable for any company, regardless of their sector. However, it is particulary designed for trade and manufacturing companies and their logistics providers.
The SMP module “Taxonofy” aims at companies which have to report their ESG indicators according to the CSRD and EU-Taxonomy and are required to report because of their size, turnover or total balance sheet.

No, to use the SMP, companies do not need to hire or be sustainability experts. WAVES takes over this part! We introduce you to the use of the platform, create an API to your ERP or TMS systems or show you how to quickly set up a mapping to automatically calculate your company’s sustainability data!

We will be happy to provide you with a qualified consultant to guide you through the requirements and explain the advantages of the SMP. Please contact us!

In order to guarantee our customers reliable CO₂– data at all times, we had the calculation of emissions in transport and logistics in the SMP modules “Sustainable Tendering” for shippers and “Sustainable Transport” for carriers tested by TÜV Rheinland.
After a thorough testing process, the TÜV experts certifiedat that the methodology developed by WAVES for calculating logistics emissions in the Sustainability Management Platform (SMP) is scientifically sound, reflects the state of the art and complies with the requirements of the GLEC framework and the EN 16258 standard.

The validity can be verified using the certificate ID 0000083615 at www.certipedia.com.

As an innovation company, we are always working towards obtaining additional confirmation of the performance of our platform through quality seals in the areas of sustainability and digitalisation. We have received the following awards so far (as of June 2022):

“Solar Impulse Efficient Solution” label (2021).
“CLOUD TECH INNOVATOR OF THE YEAR 2021” by the Cloud Community Europe-Luxembourg
“World Summit Award” in the category “Environment & Green Energy” (2022)
“Benelux Enterprise Award”, awarded by EU Business News (2022)

At WAVES, we can calculate emissions down to the shipment level. We define a shipment as a single transport good that has been transported from an agreed starting point to the planned destination, regardless of the number of legs or transport modes.