A customer sends an ESG questionnaire and the search begins: old emails, filing cabinets for utility bills, the accountant for numbers sent six months ago. Two days to assemble data that should take an hour.
The data exists. It is scattered across invoices, emails, HR files, and the waste contractor's portal. What is missing is a system.
| First question | Short answer |
|---|---|
| What do I track? | Eight metrics: electricity, gas, fuel, water, waste generated, waste recycled, headcount, safety incidents. |
| Where do they live? | Utility bills, fuel-card statements, waste contractor invoices, payroll, the incident log. |
| Spreadsheet or tool? | Either. A spreadsheet works if the format stays consistent; a tool calculates emissions and keeps trends. |
| How much time? | About 20 minutes to set up with last month's bills to hand; then a short monthly entry. |
| Why not wait until asked? | Because the questionnaire arrives with a deadline, and twelve months of history cannot be reconstructed in a week. |
A system, not only a spreadsheet
Most suppliers start with a spreadsheet. It works until the second questionnaire, when the data turns out to be in slightly different formats, a formula broke when someone added a row, and nobody knows which version is current.
A tracking system means entering data once, in a consistent format, on a schedule. When a questionnaire arrives, the data is organized and ready. A short entry each month replaces two days of reconstruction.
The eight metrics
These cover most of what ESG questionnaires ask for and align with the EU's VSME standard and the major assessment platforms.
- Electricity (kWh). Monthly bills or the provider's portal; most allow a twelve-month CSV download.
- Natural gas (m³). Gas bills. Note whether the provider reports m³, therms, or kWh, and stay consistent.
- Fuel (liters). Fuel receipts, fuel-card statements, or fleet records. Diesel and petrol separately; different emission factors.
- Water (m³). Water bills. On a flat rate without metering, ask the provider for consumption data or estimate from benchmarks.
- Waste generated (metric tons). Waste contractor invoices. Most haulers provide annual tonnage on request.
- Waste recycled (metric tons or %). Same invoices. If recycling is not broken out, ask; they track it for their own reporting.
- Headcount. HR or payroll. Use the average for the period, not a single date.
- Health and safety incidents. Incident reports, the safety log, or OSHA or equivalent records. Recordable injuries and lost-time incidents.
Eight numbers, updated monthly.
Want this as an interactive spreadsheet?
78 items across Environment, Social, and Governance — with status dropdowns, priority fields, owner columns, and an auto-calculated readiness score.
Where the data lives
Utility bills (electricity, gas, water). Monthly or quarterly. Provider portals hold historical data. If paper bills were discarded, ask the provider for a twelve-month consumption summary.
Fuel receipts or fleet records. Fuel-card statements for company vehicles. If employees expense fuel, pull fuel expenses from accounting.
Waste contractor invoices. Collections, bin sizes, tonnage. If tonnage is not listed, ask for an annual waste summary.
HR or payroll. Headcount, turnover, demographics, exportable from most platforms.
Incident reports. A safety management system if one exists; otherwise internal records or insurance claims.
Setup with ESG Passport
A spreadsheet is a valid choice. For a system that calculates emissions, tracks trends, and connects to questionnaire responses, the setup with ESG Passport is:
Step 1 — open the workspace (1 minute). Go to ESG Passport. Free to start; no account, no card, no download. It runs in the browser and the data stays on your device.
Step 2 — company profile (2 minutes). Company name, sector, country, employee count. This sets the baseline and the emission factors for your region.
Step 3 — first month of data (10 minutes). Whatever period you have bills for. Last month's electricity, gas, water, and waste invoices. Enter the numbers; the system converts units and calculates emissions. Do not try to enter history yet.
Step 4 — import history if you have it (5 minutes). From a spreadsheet or a provider's consumption download, use the CSV import to load several months at once. This gives a baseline for year-on-year comparison.
Step 5 — monthly reminder (1 minute). A recurring calendar event on the 1st or 15th: "Enter last month's ESG data."
With bills to hand, the setup is about 20 minutes. After that it is maintenance.
The monthly habit
On the 1st or 15th, with last month's bills: enter the numbers, update headcount if it changed, log any incidents. If a month is missed, enter it when you catch up. Late data is better than none.
The return comes when a questionnaire arrives. Open the dashboard, check it is current, respond. Energy, emissions, and workforce metrics are already organized.
What consistent tracking produces
Calculated emissions. Energy and fuel consumption converted to Scope 1 and Scope 2 using current regional factors.
Trends. After twelve months, whether energy, emissions, and waste are rising or falling. Customers read the direction.
VSME-aligned metrics. The data maps to the EU standard for SMEs, the default framework for supply chain ESG reporting in Europe. The double materiality guide explains why customers request it.
Faster responses. The paid version of ESG Passport (€499, one-time) uploads the questionnaire and drafts answers from the tracked data.
If you are not ready for a full system
Check readiness. The free VSME readiness assessment shows which metrics are missing.
Estimate emissions now. The carbon footprint calculator gives a first figure from data you already have.
Startups. The startup ESG page and the guide on what investors actually check cover building tracking in from the start.
The companies that handle ESG well are not the ones with the largest sustainability teams. They built a simple system early and kept it running.