Set Up Data for Oracle Fusion Cloud Sustainability

Corporate sustainability has become a priority for organizations worldwide as stakeholders demand sustainability data to be reportable, traceable, and auditable. With most companies still managing sustainability data in spreadsheets residing in disparate systems, it is becoming increasingly difficult to gather and organize this data. Oracle Sustainability helps address this challenge by letting you capture and manage sustainability data, and then providing visible insights for impactful decision-making to meet sustainability targets. The setups in Oracle Sustainability help populate data in a flexible framework so that activities are recorded, emissions are calculated, and activities are posted to the Sustainability Ledger, a source of truth for reporting.

To set up Oracle Sustainability, it's recommended to plan for the activities you want to track. Next, perform the required tasks under your offering, and then enter or upload your sustainability data.

For planning and preparing data, refer to Tips and Considerations.

To use Oracle Sustainability, you must perform a sequence of setup tasks. The required setup tasks include setting up a sustainability ledger, configuring the types of sustainability activities you want to track, the attributes specific to those types of activities, and the values these attributes can have. Additionally, ensure that the standard Fusion setups required for Oracle Sustainability, such as Legal Entities, Accounting Calendar, Currencies, Inventory Organizations, and Units of Measure (UOMs) are configured within your Fusion instance and can be referenced by the activities and emission factors you intend to use. If you plan to use the Oracle Sustainability calculator to calculate emissions, you’ll also need to set up emission factor mappings and global warming potentials to ensure that the calculator uses your preferred emission factors.

Configuring Oracle Fusion Cloud Sustainability

Configuring Oracle Fusion Cloud Sustainability

NOTE: As a prerequisite, most of the standard Fusion setup tasks should have been completed as part of your existing implementation. If there are additional setup entities needed, create and configure them before proceeding to the Oracle Sustainability setup tasks. If you plan to reference Suppliers and Items in Oracle Sustainability Emission Factor Mappings or Activities, ensure that they are already created in your instance.

Steps to Enable

Use the Opt In UI to enable this feature. For instructions, refer to the Optional Uptake of New Features section of this document.

Offering: Procurement

  1. Ensure that you have enabled the Sustainability functional area under your offering. The Sustainability functional area is shared under Procurement, Product Management, and Manufacturing and Supply Chain Materials Management offerings.

Opt In: Procurement

Opt In: Procurement

  1. Identify the users who will perform setup tasks and those who will create and manage sustainability activities. Ensure that you assign security privileges or predefined job roles to your Sustainability users. Oracle Sustainability provides a set of predefined job roles to set up the application and manage the day-to-day operations. See the Access Requirements section for the list of security privileges and predefined job roles that you can assign to users.

  2. Configure the required and optional setup tasks by accessing the corresponding tasks from the Setup and Maintenance work area.

Fig: Setup and Maintenance: Sustainability

Setup and Maintenance: Sustainability

Setup tasks:

  • Manage Sustainability Ledgers - Use this task to create a sustainability ledger for your sustainability reporting. A sustainability ledger is the source of truth in Oracle Sustainability for reporting. Oracle Sustainability allows you to maintain one or more sustainability ledgers with a unique name, an accounting calendar, and a first period. The accounting calendar associated with the sustainability ledger is a calendar that’s defined in Oracle Fusion Cloud Financials. The first period assigned to the ledger indicates the period from which the ledger is operational. The ledger defines which accounting calendar will be used by different legal entities of your organization. It helps establish a cadence and discipline around period closure to ensure timely and accurate sustainability reporting.

After the ledger is configured, you can retrieve future periods from the accounting calendar starting from the first period assigned to the sustainability ledger. When you create an activity, the sustainability ledger is automatically derived based on the legal entity entered on the activity. Refer to What's New for Update 24D: Maintain Sustainability Ledger As the Source of Truth for Statutory Reporting for more details.

NOTE: A sustainability ledger is not a financial ledger and has no relation to your financial accounting process.

  • Manage Sustainability Lookups (optional) - Use this task to add or edit values of lookups that are available for Oracle Sustainability. Lookups are lists of values in an application. In application pages, you'll see the list of translated meanings as the values available for selection. Refer to Overview of Lookups for the configuration level of a lookup type that determines whether the lookups in that lookup type can be edited. At a high level, Oracle Sustainability supports the lookups listed below:

    Sustainability Lookups

    Lookup Types

    Lookups and Values

    Predefined system lookups
    • Sustainability Activity Status with predefined values: Draft, Posted, and Canceled.
    • Scope and Scope Category for emission scopes with predefined values: Scope 1, Scope 2 location-based, Scope 2 market-based, and Scope 3. The Scope Category is predefined with the 15 categories under which Scope 3 emissions are reported as defined by the Greenhouse Gas Protocol.
    • Calculation Mode to calculate emissions with predefined values: Using matched factors, Manual entry of factors, and Manual entry of emissions.
    • Entry Type for the type of entry for the record with predefined values: Standard and Adjustment.
    • Validation Message Level and Validation Message Summary for the level of severity for a validation message like an error, a warning, or information, and for summary of the validation message.
    • Sustainability Period Status for sustainability periods with predefined values: Open or Closed.
    • Modes for Process Sustainability Activities Scheduled Process with predefined values: Post to ledger and Validate.

    Extensible lookups
    • Sustainability Activity Source to include source systems from which sustainability activities will be generated or imported into Oracle Sustainability with predefined values: Manual entry, External, Payable Invoice, and File-based data import.

    User lookups
    • Data Quality Indicator for accuracy of an activity’s measures or the emission factors with predefined values: High confidence, Moderate confidence, and Low confidence. 
    • Emission Types with many predefined Greenhouse gases and other substances such as air pollutants.
    • Measure Types associated with an activity with predefined values: Quantity, Distance, and Amount.
  • Manage Sustainability Descriptive Flexfields and Manage Sustainability Valuesets - Use this task to track additional information important and unique to the business. There are two descriptive flexfields associated with Oracle Sustainability:
    • Activity Descriptive Flexfield (optional): Use this Descriptive Flexfield to extend the data attributes you want to capture on activities. For example, you can add an Activity Descriptive Flexfield to capture the facility associated with an activity. Refer to Overview of Descriptive Flexfields for more information about Descriptive Flexfields.
    • Emission Factor Map Descriptive Flexfield (mandatory): To model an activity type in Oracle Sustainability, as a prerequisite, you must configure the activity type as a context value of the Emission Factor Map Descriptive Flexfield and define the associated activity type attributes as its context-sensitive segments. For each attribute of the activity type, create a value set and then populate its values. Note that when creating value sets for the Emission Factor Map Descriptive Flexfield, use only validation type Table or Independent. The following table lists various activity types that you can create as Descriptive Flexfield contexts and corresponding activity type attributes that you can create as context-sensitive segments.

      Activity Types Examples

      Use Case

      Activity Type as  Descriptive Flexfield Context

      Activity Type Attributes as Context-Sensitive Segments (with Value Sets and their Values)

      Capture fuel consumption data and calculate Scope 1 stationary combustion emissions

      Stationary Combustion
      • Fuel Type

      Capture fuel or energy consumption and distance traveled to calculate Scope 1 mobile combustion emissions

      Mobile Combustion
      • Energy Source
      • Vehicle Type
      • Percent Laden

      Capture energy consumption and calculate Scope 2 emissions

      Purchased Energy
      • Grid Region
      • Energy Type

      Capture data on purchases of energy instruments such as Energy Attribute Certificates or Power Purchase Agreements

      Purchased Energy Instrument
      • Grid Region
      • Energy Type

      Capture data on purchases of goods and services

      Purchased Goods and Services
      • Spend Type

      Capture water consumption

      Water Withdrawal
      • Water Source Type

      Capture waste generated

      Waste Generated in Operations
      • Waste Type
      • Waste Disposal Method
      • Handling Method
  • Manage Activity Types: Once you have configured the Descriptive Flexfields setup and value sets for activity types and activity type attributes, you can use the configured activity types to identify their scope and define the measure type and emission type associations.
    • Measure Types: A measure type describes the quantitative data you want to capture on an activity record. For example, on a Stationary Combustion activity, you typically capture the quantity of fuel consumed. On a Mobile Combustion activity, you typically capture both the quantity of fuel and the distance traveled. On a Purchased Goods and Services activity, you might want to capture both the quantity purchased and the amount spent. On a volunteering activity, you might capture the time spent. Oracle provides three predefined measure types: Quantity, Distance, and Amount which you can extend.
    • Emission types: An emission type is a greenhouse gas or other pollutant (for example, an air pollutant) whose emissions you want to calculate or enter. Examples of greenhouse gas or other pollutants include carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e), and Particulate Matter 2.5 (PM 2.5). For an activity type that generates emissions, you’ll need to define one or more emission types.

The configured activity types thus provide a way of classifying your sustainability activities.

  • Manage Sustainability Profile Options: Use this task to set changeable options that affect the way your application looks and behaves. The following are the profile options that are available in Oracle Sustainability and for which you need to set values:
    • CO2e Reporting UOM: Specify the CO2e reporting unit of measurement. The calculator will convert carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) to this common unit of measure for reporting and rollup across activities.
    • Currency Conversion Rate Type: Specify the currency conversion rate type for converting the measure currency to the emission factor denominator currency when both the following conditions are true:
      • Emissions are calculated using spend-based emission factors.
      • The currency in the activity is different from that of the emission factor denominator.
    • Default Activity Type for Invoice Classification: Specify the value when no classification rules apply for an Account Payables invoice or when the classification on the rule is not valid.
    • Item Master Validation Organization: Specify the value if you’ll be referencing items in your activities or emission factor mappings.
  • Manage Global Warming Potentials (optional): Use this task to create, edit, or delete GWPs, which the Oracle Sustainability calculator uses to calculate the CO2e of emissions of greenhouse gases other than CO2. Alternatively, you can use the sample GWPs provided through accelerator sheets to have the application calculate the CO2e emissions for greenhouse gases other than CO2 that are associated with the activity types you have defined. The sample GWPs are based on IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5). If you want to use AR6 values, then you can update the values.
  1. If you want to use Oracle Sustainability to calculate emissions, then you’ll need to set up emission factors using emission factor mappings.

An emission factor mapping is a record that maps an activity type and a set of attribute values to an emission factor for a specific emission type. To calculate an activity’s emissions for a specific emission type, the calculator finds the emission factor mappings that match the activity and the emission type. The ranking on the mapping specifies the priority of the mapping when an activity matches multiple emission factor mappings for the same emission type. You can specify Legal Entity, Supplier, and Country details in the emission factor mappings if required, and map activities with different attribute values to different emission factors. Refer to What's new for Update 24D: Calculate Emissions Associated with Sustainability Activities for more details.

To enter emission factor mappings, you must use a Visual Builder(VB) Add-in spreadsheet. Oracle Sustainability provides a step-by-step guide to prepare and upload data using VB add-in spreadsheets. Refer to Oracle Visual Builder Add-in for Excel for creating the spreadsheet and uploading emission factor mappings.

  1. If you plan to generate activities from Accounts Payable invoices, then additionally set up invoice classification rules as well.

Here's a demo of these capabilities:

Tips And Considerations

Planning and Preparation

Oracle recommends that you plan and prepare your sustainability data before setting up Oracle Sustainability. For planning, you’ll need to make a series of decisions about the data you want to track in Oracle Sustainability. For example, you must decide on the activity types that you want to track. Then you must identify the attributes for the activity types, and the values those attributes can have. You must also decide how many sustainability ledgers you want to maintain, which legal entities to be assigned to each ledger, and the accounting calendar that should be associated with each ledger. If you plan to generate sustainability activities from invoices, then you'll need to identify the invoice classification rules that you will set up.

Oracle recommends that you use the accelerator spreadsheet templates that Oracle provides to prepare your data for activity types and emission calculations. Most of these templates contain data you can use for common activity types, attribute values, and emission factors. You can delete the data you don’t need and optionally add your own data. Alternatively, you can delete all the prepopulated data and populate the templates with just your own data.

Oracle provides templates with:

  • Prepopulated common activity types.
  • Prepopulated emission factor mappings from the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the United Kingdom (UK) government.
  • Prepopulated value sets containing reference data (for example, vehicle types, fuel types, and spend types) used in the EPA and UK emission factor mappings.
  • Prepopulated GWP values for many emission types. The Oracle Sustainability calculator uses these GWPs to calculate the CO2e of emissions of greenhouse gases other than CO2.
  • A sample ledger setup with accounting calendar and legal entity assignment.
  • A sample set of invoice classification rules.
  • Sample activities of common types.

Loading Data

You can choose to enter the data directly using the application or you can copy the data you have populated in the accelerator spreadsheet templates into VB Add-in spreadsheets.

After you complete the setups, you can create activities and post them to a sustainability ledger. Refer to What's new for Update 24D: Manage Sustainability Activities for more details.

If you’ve set up emission factor mappings, then the application will calculate emissions as soon as activities are created.

REST APIs are available for the following Oracle Sustainability setup tasks:

  • Create, update, delete, and view activity types. Manage emission type and measure type associations to activity types.
  • Create, update, delete, and view emission factor mappings.
  • Create, update, delete, and view global warming potentials.
  • Create, update, and view sustainability ledgers and assign legal entities.

Key Resources

Access Requirements

Configure custom job roles applicable to your business for users performing respective functions. Oracle Sustainability has following predefined job roles:

  • Sustainability Application Administrator: Responsible for setting up and configuring Oracle Sustainability to meet the needs of the business.
  • Sustainability Integration Specialist: Responsible for planning, coordinating, and supervising all activities related to the integration of sustainability information systems.
  • Sustainability Analyst: Responsible for the creation, management, and posting of activity records, resulting in one or more sustainability ledgers that can serve as data sources for analysis and reporting.
  • Sustainability Controller:  Responsible for the review of sustainability analytics to ensure progress is in line with the company's sustainability goals. 

You can either directly assign the predefined job roles or assign a configured job role with given set of privileges as listed below:

  • Users who are assigned a configured job role that contains the following privileges can manage sustainability ledgers:
    • Manage Sustainability Ledger (SUS_MANAGE_LEDGERS_PRIV) 
    • Manage Sustainability Ledger Period (SUS_MANAGE_LEDGER_PERIODS_PRIV)
  • Users who are assigned a configured job role that contains the below privilege can manage Activity Types:
    • Manage Sustainability Activity Type (SUS_MANAGE_ACTIVITY_TYPES_PRIV) 
  • Users who are assigned a configured job role that contains the below privilege can enter Emission Factor Mappings:
    • Manage Emission Factor Mapping (SUS_MANAGE_EMISSION_FACTORS_PRIV) 
  • Users who are assigned a configured job role that contains the below privilege can enter Global Warming Potentials:
    • Manage Global Warming Potential (SUS_MANAGE_GWP_PRIV)