What the Conversion Engine does for you
Altruistiq's Conversion Engine is an advanced data preprocessing system that automatically transforms your business activity data into the correct units needed for accurate emissions calculations.
The quality of your emissions calculations depends on using consistent measurement units between your activity data and the corresponding emission factors. Our Conversion Engine eliminates unit mismatches by automatically converting your data from the units you provide into the precise units required by our emission factor database, ensuring seamless and accurate calculations without the complexity of manual unit conversions.
Key terms you'll need
Activity Data is the quantitative measurements of business activities that generate greenhouse gas emissions. This raw input information, such as fuel consumed, electricity used, or kilometres travelled, drives your emissions calculations.
Conversion Factor is the mathematical relationship that transforms one unit into another. For example, converting pounds to kilograms or MWh to kWh.
Dimension is a property of a physical quantity that can be measured, such as mass, volume, energy, distance, or monetary value. Conversions can happen within the same dimension (miles to kilometres) or across dimensions (location to distance).
Unit Normalisation is the process of converting your activity data from its original units to the standardised units required by our emission factors, ensuring compatibility for accurate calculations.
How the Conversion Engine processes your data
The process follows three simple steps:
1. Activity data input You provide data about your business activities in whatever units are most convenient for you, such as:
Energy consumption: MWh, BTU, therms, or any other energy units
Transportation: Miles, feet, yards, or location addresses
Materials: Pounds, tonnes, gallons, litres, or various volume/weight units
Expenditure: Any currency for spend-based calculations
2. Smart unit transformation The engine automatically identifies the units in your data and applies the appropriate conversion factors. For example:
If your electricity data is in MWh but the emission factor is per kWh, it converts using the factor (1 MWh = 1,000 kWh)
If you provide locations instead of distances, it calculates the actual travel distance using Google Maps APIs
If your spend data is in EUR but the emission factor is in USD, it applies current exchange rates
3. Intelligent conversion pathways When direct conversions aren't available, the engine creates conversion chains through intermediate units:
Unit chains: Converting stones → pounds → kilograms → metric tons when no direct stone-to-metric-ton factor exists
Currency chains: Converting JPY → EUR → MXN when no direct Japanese Yen to Mexican Peso rate exists
Cross-dimensional conversions: Transforming fuel quantities into energy units or locations into distances
How the Conversion Engine aligns to standards
All calculations align with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol standards:
The Greenhouse Gas Protocol: A Corporate Accounting and Reporting Standard (Revised Edition)
The Greenhouse Gas Protocol: Scope 2 Guidance
The Greenhouse Gas Protocol: Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Standard
Altruistiq’s methodology and software is ISO 14064-1 assured by LRQA
Further Reading
Support Conversion Methods
Within Dimension
Cross Dimension
Other Reading
Getting started
To use Altruistiq's Conversion Engine, start uploading your data