About this document. This guidance was prepared in 2026 as a good-faith effort to document how the Higg platform calculated the FEM 2017 energy, greenhouse gas, water, waste and refrigerant values. FEM 2017 predates the calculation model maintained by Cascale today: the platform applied its own conversion factors and emission factors and wrote the results back into the assessment as answers, where data consumers see them next to the facility’s own answers. What follows is reconstructed from the FEM 2017 question and answer definitions, from those stored results across 8,151 assessments, and from the release history. It may not accurately describe all platform behaviour, in particular edge cases that leave no trace in the data. Statements derived from the data rather than from a specification are marked observed, with the number of filings behind them.

Water Data

Facilities flagged each water source used (yes/no/unknown per source) and then reported the annual quantity and unit for each source they track. Water is reported for the site as a whole; there is no facility-type or domestic/production split in FEM 2017.

Source	Displayed as	Quantity and unit ref_ids	Platform litre total
`watsourcesurface`	Fresh Surface Water	`watsourcesurfacequant` `watsourcesurfaceunit`	`watsourcesurfacetotal`
`watsourcerain`	Rainwater	`watsourcerainquant` `watsourcerainunit`	`watsourceraintotal`
`watsourceground`	Groundwater	`watsourcegroundquant` `watsourcegroundunit`	`watsourcegroundtotal`
`watsourceprod`	Produced/Process Water	`watsourceprodquant` `watsourceprodunit`	`watsourceprodtotal`
`watsourcemunicipal`	Municipal Water	`watsourcemunicipalquant` `watsourcemunicipalunit`	`watsourcemunicipaltotal`
`watsourcewastewater`	Wastewater from another organization	`watsourcewastewaterquant` `watsourcewastewaterunit`	`watsourcewastewatertotal`
`watsourcesea`	Brackish surface water/seawater	`watsourceseaquant` `watsourceseaunit`	`watsourceseatotal`
`watsourcecomb`	Water- general or unknown origin	`watsourcecombquant` `watsourcecombunit`	`watsourcecombtotal`

Unit answers are numeric codes:

Answer code	Unit
1	CCF
2	cu ft
3	cu yard
4	gal
5	liter
6	m3
7	Ml

The platform converted every quantity to litres with the factors below (observed as total ÷ quantity):

Unit	Litres per unit	Filings
m3	1000.0000	7517
liter	1.0000	587
cu ft	28.3168	254
gal	3.7854	245
CCF	2831.6800	130
cu yard	764.5540	129
Ml	0.0010	5

Note on “Ml”. The unit displayed as “Ml” (megalitres) was converted as 0.001 litres, that is as millilitres, in every FEM cadence through 2022. A facility reporting 5 Ml of water had 0.005 litres counted.

Water Aggregates

watsource[source]total — litres from one source.

No withdrawal/recycled split was published in FEM 2017; every source counts towards the single total.

watsourcetotaltotal — litres across all eight sources. Observed to equal the sum of its components in 98% of 6,813 filings.

watsourcetotalperday — watsourcetotaltotal divided by the operating days watopdays. Observed to equal the sum of its components in 100% of 6,813 filings.

Waste Data

Waste is reported by stream, split into non-hazardous and hazardous streams, each with a quantity and a unit.

Non-hazardous streams

Stream	Displayed as	Quantity and unit ref_ids	Platform kg total
`wstsourcenhmaterials`	Materials	`wstsourcenhmaterialsquant` `wstsourcenhmaterialsunit`	`wstsourcenhmaterialstotal`
`wstsourcenhmetal`	Metal	`wstsourcenhmetalquant` `wstsourcenhmetalunit`	`wstsourcenhmetaltotal`
`wstsourcenhplastic`	Plastic	`wstsourcenhplasticquant` `wstsourcenhplasticunit`	`wstsourcenhplastictotal`
`wstsourcenhpaper`	Paper	`wstsourcenhpaperquant` `wstsourcenhpaperunit`	`wstsourcenhpapertotal`
`wstsourcenhcans`	Cans	`wstsourcenhcansquant` `wstsourcenhcansunit`	`wstsourcenhcanstotal`
`wstsourcenhfood`	Food	`wstsourcenhfoodquant` `wstsourcenhfoodunit`	`wstsourcenhfoodtotal`
`wstsourcenhglass`	Glass	`wstsourcenhglassquant` `wstsourcenhglassunit`	`wstsourcenhglasstotal`
`wstsourcenhcartons`	Cartons	`wstsourcenhcartonsquant` `wstsourcenhcartonsunit`	`wstsourcenhcartonstotal`
`wstsourcenhother`	Other	`wstsourcenhotherquant` `wstsourcenhotherunit`	`wstsourcenhothertotal`
`wstsourcenhtotaldom`	General or unspecified waste	`wstsourcenhtotaldomquant` `wstsourcenhtotaldomunit`	`wstsourcenhtotaldomtotal`

Hazardous streams

Stream	Displayed as	Quantity and unit ref_ids	Platform kg total
`wstsourcehprodchemdrum`	Empty chemical drums and containers	`wstsourcehprodchemdrumquant` `wstsourcehprodchemdrumunit`	`wstsourcehprodchemdrumtotal`
`wstsourcehprodfilmprint`	Film and Printing Frame	`wstsourcehprodfilmprintquant` `wstsourcehprodfilmprintunit`	`wstsourcehprodfilmprinttotal`
`wstsourcehprodsludge`	Wastewater treatment sludge (industrial/domestic)	`wstsourcehprodsludgequant` `wstsourcehprodsludgeunit`	`wstsourcehprodsludgetotal`
`wstsourcehprodchem`	Expired/unused/used chemicals (waste oil, solvents, reactants, etc.)	`wstsourcehprodchemquant` `wstsourcehprodchemunit`	`wstsourcehprodchemtotal`
`wstsourcehprodcompgas`	Compressed Gas Cylinders (refrigerants, etc.)	`wstsourcehprodcompgasquant` `wstsourcehprodcompgasunit`	`wstsourcehprodcompgastotal`
`wstsourcehprodcontammat`	Contaminated materials	`wstsourcehprodcontammatquant` `wstsourcehprodcontammatunit`	`wstsourcehprodcontammattotal`
`wstsourcehdombatteries`	Batteries	`wstsourcehdombatteriesquant` `wstsourcehdombatteriesunit`	`wstsourcehdombatteriestotal`
`wstsourcehdomflolight`	Fluorescent light bulb	`wstsourcehdomflolightquant` `wstsourcehdomflolightunit`	`wstsourcehdomflolighttotal`
`wstsourcehdominkcart`	Ink cartridges	`wstsourcehdominkcartquant` `wstsourcehdominkcartunit`	`wstsourcehdominkcarttotal`
`wstsourcehdomoilgrease`	Waste oil and grease (from cooking)	`wstsourcehdomoilgreasequant` `wstsourcehdomoilgreaseunit`	`wstsourcehdomoilgreasetotal`
`wstsourcehdomemptycont`	Empty containers (cleaning, sanitizing, pesticides, etc.)	`wstsourcehdomemptycontquant` `wstsourcehdomemptycontunit`	`wstsourcehdomemptyconttotal`
`wstsourcehdomelectronic`	Electronic waste	`wstsourcehdomelectronicquant` `wstsourcehdomelectronicunit`	`wstsourcehdomelectronictotal`
`wstsourcehdomcoalcomb`	Coal combustion residuals (fly ash and bottom ash/coal slag)	`wstsourcehdomcoalcombquant` `wstsourcehdomcoalcombunit`	`wstsourcehdomcoalcombtotal`
`wstsourcehother`	Other	`wstsourcehotherquant` `wstsourcehotherunit`	`wstsourcehothertotal`

Unit answers are numeric codes; non-hazardous streams use a mass-only set and hazardous streams a set that also allows volumes:

Non-hazardous waste units

Answer code	Unit
1	g
2	kg
3	lb
4	oz
5	ton (metric)
6	ton (short)

Hazardous waste units

Answer code	Unit
1	g
2	kg
3	lb
4	oz
5	ton (metric)
6	ton (short)
7	barrels (16 kg/ea)
8	CCF
9	cu ft
10	cu yard
11	gal
12	liter
13	m3
14	Ml

The platform converted each quantity to kilograms with these factors (observed). Volume units of hazardous waste convert as if the waste had the density of water (1 litre = 1 kg), the “barrels (16 kg/ea)” unit counts 16 kg per barrel, and “Ml” has the same millilitre reading as for water.

Unit	Kilograms per unit	Filings
kg	1.0000	19440
ton (metric)	1000.0000	2533
liter	1.0000	778
lb	0.4535	568
barrels (16 kg/ea)	16.0000	314
ton (short)	907.1850	207
m3	1000.0000	151
g	0.0010	119
gal	3.7854	75
Ml	0.0010	30
oz	0.0283	11
CCF	2831.6800	4
cu ft	28.3168	3
cu yard	764.5540	3

Waste Aggregates

wstsource[stream]total — kilograms of one stream.

No hazardous / non-hazardous subtotals were published in FEM 2017.

wstsourcetotal — kilograms across every stream. Observed to equal the sum of its components in 98% of 6,993 filings.

FEM 2017 Water and Waste Calculations

Water Data

Water Aggregates

Waste Data

Waste Aggregates