Carbon Minds

Carbon Minds provides the largest environmental lifecycle database dedicated to the chemical and plastics industry. The Carbon Minds database covers over 1,500 chemicals and plastics across 200+ regions, with production and consumption mixes as well as individual technology routes. If you need granular, substance-specific emission factors for chemicals, polymers, or plastics, Carbon Minds is the most comprehensive source available.

We offer Carbon Minds data through our Data Studio, API, Excel add-in, and Google Sheets extension. Carbon Minds factors are also available for PCF calculations through our PCF API and Autopilot when included in your plan.

Overview of Carbon Minds

The cm.chemicals database is built and maintained by Carbon Minds, a Cologne-based sustainability data provider that originated from research at RWTH Aachen University. The database provides over 119,000 emission factors across 224 regions and nearly 2,000 distinct activities, all focused on chemical value chains.

Carbon Minds covers basic chemicals, chemical intermediates, formulated products, and materials including polymers and plastics. The dataset includes over 1,500 chemicals with individual technology routes. The most common 89 also include production and consumption mixes for each region:

• Production mixes: weighted average of all production technologies in a given region
• Consumption mixes: weighted average reflecting what is actually consumed in a region (including imports)
• Individual technology routes: emission factors for specific production processes (e.g. steam cracking, chlor-alkali electrolysis)

This means you can compare the CO2 footprint of the same chemical produced in different regions, by different technologies, or consumed through different trade patterns.

When Carbon Minds adds value

Carbon Minds is the right choice when you need:

• Product carbon footprints (PCFs) for chemical or plastic products. If your product contains chemical inputs or polymer components, Carbon Minds provides the substance-specific, region-specific factors that generic databases cannot match.
• Scope 3.1 assessments for chemical procurement. When you purchase chemicals or plastics and need to estimate their upstream footprint with more precision than spend-based factors can offer.
• Supplier benchmarking. Comparing the carbon intensity of the same chemical from different regions or production routes to inform sourcing decisions.
• R&D and product design. Evaluating the environmental impact of alternative materials, formulations, or feedstocks (fossil vs. renewable production routes) during product development.
• TfS compliance. The Carbon Minds methodology is TUV-certified for compliance with Together for Sustainability (TfS) PCF guidelines, which is the chemical industry’s standard for product carbon footprinting.

When Carbon Minds is not the right fit

If your calculation involves materials outside the chemical and plastics sector (metals, construction materials, electronics, agriculture, etc.), Carbon Minds will not cover those. Use ecoinvent for broad cross-sector LCA data, or sustamize for metals and composites.

If you only need a high-level spend-based estimate of your chemical procurement, EXIOBASE may be sufficient as a first pass. Carbon Minds adds value when you need to go beyond sector averages and distinguish between specific substances, regions, and production routes.

Methodology

Activity-based LCA data

Carbon Minds is an activity-based LCI (Life Cycle Inventory) database. All emission factors are expressed in physical units (typically kgCO2e per kg of substance produced) and cover the full cradle-to-gate lifecycle of each chemical or plastic, from raw material extraction through production.

The underlying methodology is built specifically for chemical value chains. Unlike general-purpose LCA databases that model chemicals as one sector among many, Carbon Minds models the full production chain from resource extraction (crude oil, natural gas) through intermediate chemicals to final products, with detailed attention to the chemical engineering processes involved.

Production and consumption mixes vs. technology routes

For each substance and region, Carbon Minds provides multiple types of emission factors:

In most cases, the consumption mix is the appropriate default, since it reflects the actual market supply in the region where you purchased the chemical. Use production mixes when you know the production country, and technology routes when you have supplier-specific process data.

Region definition

Carbon Minds covers over 200 regions, from individual countries to regional aggregates (EU-27, global average). For each chemical, the database includes every region where that substance is produced or imported. This level of regionalisation is significantly more granular than most general-purpose databases.

When your supplier’s region is known, use the corresponding country-level factor. When it is unknown, use the consumption mix for the country where you purchased the chemical, or fall back to a regional or global average.

Scope and coverage

The database covers the main chemicals and plastics responsible for approximately 75% of the global chemical industry’s greenhouse gas emissions. Major chemical groups include:

• Organic chemicals (olefins, aromatics, alcohols, acids, esters, etc.)
• Inorganic chemicals (chlorine, caustic soda, industrial gases, etc.)
• Polymers and plastics (PE, PP, PVC, PS, PET, PA, PUR, etc.)
• Chemical intermediates and formulated products
• Both fossil and renewable production routes, where relevant

Update frequency and versioning

Carbon Minds updates the Carbon Minds database annually. Each update incorporates the latest production, trade, and technology data, as well as methodological improvements. The current version available through our platform is Carbon Minds V2.02 (released 2025).

Updates may include new substances, additional regions, revised allocation rules (e.g. compliance with product category rules for steam cracking or chlor-alkali processes), and updated background data on oil and gas extraction emissions.

Compliance and certification

The Carbon Minds methodology is TUV Rheinland certified and compliant with:

• ISO 14040/14044 (Life Cycle Assessment)
• ISO 14067 (Product Carbon Footprint)
• Together for Sustainability (TfS) PCF Guidelines
• UEIL/ATIEL guidelines (lubricants industry)
• GHG Protocol Product Life Cycle Standard

Note that through our platform, we provide Carbon Minds emission factors using two calculation approaches. The IPCC 2021 approach reports total kgCO2e excluding biogenic CO2, using the “climate change: total” indicator with GWP100. The ISO 14067 approach, also based on IPCC 2021, uses the “climate change” indicator with GWP100 and includes additional fields (+1/-1 methodology) for biogenic carbon accounting. The ISO 14067 indicators are only applicable when your reporting requires explicit treatment of biogenic carbon flows. For more on how biogenic emissions are handled, see our biogenic CO2 guide.

Advantages of Carbon Minds

• Deepest chemical sector coverage available. Over 1,500 chemicals and plastics with 119,000+ emission factors. No other database matches this depth for chemical value chains.
• Exceptional regional granularity. 200+ regions per substance, including country-level and (for some datasets) factory-level data. Enables meaningful supplier and region comparisons.
• Production, consumption, and technology-level detail. You can choose the right level of specificity for your use case, from broad market averages to individual production routes.
• Consistent methodology. All datasets are compiled using the same internally developed, TUV-certified methodology. This avoids the inconsistencies that arise when combining chemical data from multiple sources.
• Covers fossil and renewable routes. Includes both petrochemical and bio-based production pathways, enabling comparison of alternative feedstocks.
• TfS and ISO compliant. Ready for use in industry-standard PCF calculations and corporate sustainability reporting.
• Updated annually. Keeps pace with changes in production technologies, trade patterns, and emissions data.
• CAS number-based classification. Carbon Minds substances are identified by CAS numbers, removing ambiguity when matching procurement data to emission factors across languages, suppliers, and internal systems.

Limitations

• Premium license required. Carbon Minds data requires a separate license through us. It is not included in standard Climatiq plans.
• Chemical and plastics sector only. The database does not cover metals, construction materials, electronics, agriculture, food, transport, or other sectors. For those, use ecoinvent, sustamize, or standard sources.
• Activity-based input required. You need to know what chemical or plastic you purchased and in what quantity (kg). If you only have expenditure data, use EXIOBASE for a spend-based screening first, then refine high-impact chemical categories with Carbon Minds.
• Complexity for non-specialists. Choosing between production mix, consumption mix, and technology routes requires some understanding of chemical supply chains. When in doubt, default to the consumption mix for the purchase region. Additionally, not every chemical in your bill of materials will have an exact match in the database. In those cases, you may need to use a proxy, a chemically similar substance or a broader product category, to estimate emissions. Carbon Minds has a service offering to help with mapping. When using a proxy, verify that it is a reasonable substitute by checking that the production processes and energy intensity are comparable.
• Cradle-to-gate only. Emission factors cover production up to the factory gate. Use-phase and end-of-life emissions are not included. For a full cradle-to-grave assessment, you will need to supplement with end-of-life data from other sources (e.g. ecoinvent for waste treatment scenarios).

Best practices

Use consumption mixes as your default. Unless you have specific knowledge about the production location or technology, the consumption mix for the country where you purchased the chemical provides the most representative average.

Use Carbon Minds for your chemical and plastic inputs, ecoinvent for everything else. Combining the two is a common and defensible approach for PCFs. Use Carbon Minds for chemical-specific components where it provides deeper coverage, and ecoinvent for non-chemical inputs (activities, packaging, etc.).

Match regional factors to your actual supply chain. If you know your material comes from a German supplier, use the Germany production mix. If you buy on the open market and do not know the origin, use the consumption mix for your country or the EU-27/global average.

Leverage technology routes for supplier engagement. When working with suppliers on emissions reduction, technology-level factors let you model the impact of switching between production processes (e.g. bio-based vs. fossil feedstocks) with precision.

Document your factor choices. Record the substance, region, factor type (production/consumption/technology), and database version for each input. This is essential for TfS compliance, ISO 14067 reporting, and audit readiness.

Browse Carbon Minds emission factors in the Data Studio. For more on how we use premium data in product carbon footprinting, see our PCF Studio and PCF API documentation.

For licensing and access, visit the data licensing page or contact us.