Carbon Footprint Mode: model and report product carbon footprints in XYCLE

Carbon Footprint Mode simplifies XYCLE to climate-change impacts only, so you can model, analyse and report a product carbon footprint (PCF) aligned to ISO 14067 or the GHG Protocol without distraction from other impact categories.

When to use Carbon Footprint Mode

Use Carbon Footprint Mode when you want to:

• Build and iterate on an ISO 14067-aligned PCF without exporting data to external tools
• Focus your inventory on climate-change impacts and carbon-relevant background datasets
• Produce a carbon components breakdown for reporting or stakeholder review
• Export GHG Protocol-structured results once your scopes are complete

What Carbon Footprint Mode changes

When Carbon Footprint Mode is on, XYCLE:

• Shows only climate-change result columns: eight IPCC 2021 subcategories (including biogenic CO₂, aircraft emissions and direct land use change) and three carbon content columns (fossil, non-fossil and total, in kg C)
• Hides all other impact category columns (acidification, eutrophication, water use and others)
• Enables a Carbon components chart in the visualisation panel—an ISO 14067-aligned breakdown of your PCF across three tiers: Included in CFP, Documented separately and Considered separately
• Adds a scope filter to the inventory table so you can filter rows by GHG Protocol scope
• Shows a warning banner when inventory items have no scope value assigned

N.b. The Carbon components chart is available in the visualisation panel even when Carbon Footprint Mode is off.

What Carbon Footprint Mode does not change

The following are not affected by enabling Carbon Footprint Mode:

• Your underlying inventory—no data is removed or archived
• Uncertainty (Monte Carlo) analysis
• Impact assessment methods available for calculation

N.b. My Database datasets marked as carbon-only may produce incomplete results for non-carbon categories when used outside of Carbon Footprint Mode. XYCLE shows a warning listing these datasets when you exit the mode.

How to enable Carbon Footprint Mode

1. Select your user avatar in the top-right of the navigation bar.
2. Toggle Carbon Footprint Mode—identified by the leaf icon.
3. XYCLE immediately filters the LCIA table to climate-change columns and activates the Carbon components chart.

To exit, select the same toggle. If you have carbon-only datasets in My Database, a confirmation dialog lists them before the mode is switched off.

How to use the Carbon components chart

1. Open the Visualisation panel in your LCA model.
2. Select Carbon components from the chart type options.
3. Review your result across three ISO 14067 tiers: Included in CFP, Documented separately and Considered separately.
4. Components with no data appear greyed in the legend—use these to identify gaps in your inventory.

GHG Product Protocol export

When all input, waste and emission rows in your project have a scope assigned, the standard Export current scenario action automatically includes a GHG Protocol sheet in the downloaded Excel file. The sheet breaks down emissions by scope (1, 2 and 3) and gas (CO₂, CH₄, N₂O, SF6, HFCs and PFCs) with a total GWP column.

To assign scopes, use the scope column in the inventory table. The scope filter in Carbon Footprint Mode lets you review which rows still need a value.

Troubleshooting

The Carbon Footprint Mode toggle is not in the user menu The toggle appears when your account supports the feature.

Non-climate columns are hidden after enabling Carbon Footprint Mode This is expected. Exit Carbon Footprint Mode to restore all columns.

The GHG Protocol sheet is missing from my Excel export Every input, waste and emission row in the project must have a scope value assigned. Use the scope filter in Carbon Footprint Mode to identify rows without one.