About this document. This guidance was prepared in 2026 as a good-faith effort to document how the Higg platform calculated the FEM 2021 energy, greenhouse gas, water, waste and refrigerant values. FEM 2021 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 2021 question and answer definitions, from those stored results across 18,269 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 2021.

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`

Units are one of ccf, cuFt, cuYard, gal, liter, m3 and ml. The platform converted every quantity to litres with the factors below (observed as total ÷ quantity):

Unit	Litres per unit	Filings
m3	1000.0000	17324
liter	1.0000	2033
gal	3.7854	364
cuFt	28.3168	51
cuYard	764.5540	42
ccf	2831.6800	36
ml	0.0010	7

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.

watsourcewithdrawal — litres from surface, rain, ground, municipal and general/unknown-origin water; watsourcerecycled — litres from produced/process water, brackish or sea water and wastewater from another organisation. Observed to equal the sum of its components in 98% of 14,580 filings.

watsourcetotaltotal — litres across all eight sources. Observed to equal the sum of its components in 96% of 14,734 filings.

watsourcetotalperday — watsourcetotaltotal divided by the operating days watopdays. Observed to equal the sum of its components in 100% of 14,717 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`
`wstsourcenhwastewaterTreatmentSludge`	Wastewater treatment sludge (Non-Hazardous)	`wstsourcenhwastewaterTreatmentSludgequant` `wstsourcenhwastewaterTreatmentSludgeunit`	`wstsourcenhwastewaterTreatmentSludgetotal`
`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`

Non-hazardous streams accept mass units only (g, kg, lb, oz, tonMetric, tonShort); hazardous streams also accept volume units (barrels, ccf, cuFt, cuYard, gal, liter, m3, 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	42811
tonMetric	1000.0000	7236
liter	1.0000	1627
barrels	16.0000	739
lb	0.4535	640
tonShort	907.1850	305
g	0.0010	169
m3	1000.0000	163
gal	3.7854	136
ml	0.0010	73
cuFt	28.3168	12
oz	0.0283	9
ccf	2831.6800	8
cuYard	764.5540	2

Waste Aggregates

wstsource[stream]total — kilograms of one stream.

wstsourcetotalnonhaz and wstsourcetotalhaz — kilograms across all non-hazardous and all hazardous streams respectively. Observed to equal the sum of its components in 93% of 13,806 filings.

wstsourcetotal — kilograms across every stream. Observed to equal the sum of its components in 90% of 14,698 filings.

FEM 2021 Water and Waste Calculations

Water Data

Water Aggregates

Waste Data

Waste Aggregates