From Traceability to Carbon Accounting: A Bottom-Up ELT Architecture for Product-Level Emissions Tracking under CBAM

Abstract

The EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) has transformed carbon pricing from a theoretical policy debate into a hard financial liability. Consequently, treating environmental data merely as a compliance output is no longer practical. While supply chains restructure dynamically, traditional top-down ESG reporting relies on static averages. To transform sustainability metrics into a true Business Intelligence (BI) layer, this study presents a bottom-up Extract, Load, Transform (ELT) data architecture along with real-time dashboards for visualization. By enriching machine-level process data with component identification, we calculate product and machine-level sustainability KPIs. Electricity consumption and CO? emissions are derived either directly from the logged voltage and current values where available or via proxy models combining process duration with machine rated power constants. CO? emissions are calculated subsequently using the grid emission factor from the local energy provider. Visualizing these precise, real-time KPIs alongside operational parameters empowers managers to instantly assess environmental impacts without complex manual calculations, while also enabling the capture and analysis of highly granular, non-aggregated data at the point of generation. To generalize these findings, we introduce a 4-level Sustainability Data Maturity Model (SDMM), guiding facilities from estimate-based reporting toward precise carbon accounting. Ultimately, this architecture provides a scalable foundation for manufacturers to transition from reactive compliance to proactive, process-integrated and data-based sustainability management.  Keywords: Bottom-up carbon accounting, ELT data architecture, Digital traceability, Sustainability Data Maturity Model (SDMM), Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM)