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Building a Material Assessment: Step-by-Step
What each step covers, how the transport method affects the workflow, and how to read the Results Dashboard.
A Material Assessment is the primary working asset in ORIS. This article covers what a Material Assessment is, the steps to complete one, and how to reach the Results Dashboard.
What Is a Material Assessment?
Step 3: Site Selection (Supplier-Based Transport only)
What Is a Material Assessment?
A Material Assessment evaluates the carbon footprint, cost, and material quantities for a project or a defined portion of its scope. A single assessment can represent:
- The full project, from a unified bill of quantities (BoQ).
- A section or work package, such as the pavement, drainage, or a specific alignment. Multiple assessments can be combined in a Project Portfolio for a unified project-level view.
- A design alternative or material specification scenario, available for comparison against other assessments in the Comparison Dashboard.
Tip
Keep all assessments for the same project within a single Workspace. Both the Comparison Dashboard and the Project Portfolio draw exclusively from the active Workspace.
The Assessment Workflow
To create a new Material Assessment, go to the homepage and use the workspace selector in the left sidebar to choose the relevant workspace. Then, select Material Assessments from the list below to view existing assessments or create a new one by clicking the + button in the bottom-right corner of the list.
A Material Assessment has up to three steps. Step 3 only applies when the Supplier-Based transport method is selected in Step 2; if Manual Distance transport is used, the assessment proceeds directly to the Results Dashboard.
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1 |
Project Details Set the assessment name, location, and an optional description. |
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2 |
Bill of Quantities Select the material library and transport method. Define the hierarchy using groups and sub-groups. For each material line, specify material, quantity, and unit. Add construction operations and transport parameters as needed. |
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3 |
Site Selection (Supplier-Based only) Search the ORIS database of 50,000+ geolocated production sites, configure truck parameters, and confirm site selections per material. |
Step 1: Project Details
Assign a name and location to the assessment. The optional description field is the most reliable way to record which source data was used and other relevant project context.
Tip
Use a consistent naming convention for design alternatives: for example, "Package A - Base Design" and "Package A - Option 2". This makes assessments immediately identifiable in the Comparison Dashboard.
Step 2: Bill of Quantities
Step 2 is the core of a Material Assessment. It has two main areas: the material library & transport method selection, and the BoQ hierarchy and material entries.
MATERIAL LIBRARY
Select the material library before adding any materials. ORIS offers both global and country-specific libraries, each containing emission factors for construction materials. The library determines the emission factors and reference values used across all material lines in the assessment.
Important
A single library applies to the entire assessment. This ensures consistent reference values across all materials and keeps results comparable across users and assessments.
If a material you need is not available in the assigned library, You can use the Custom Material option: Select the Custom Material entry in the library and define the emission factor manually. This keeps the assessment moving while making the assumption transparent and auditable.
BILL OF QUANTITIES HIERARCHY AND MATERIALS
Materials in ORIS are organised within a hierarchy of groups and sub-groups that you define to reflect your project's breakdown. However, groups are structural only; all carbon and cost data originates at material level. Each material line requires a material from the library, a quantity, and a unit. A unitary cost can also be entered for each material line, but this field is optional - leaving it blank has no effect on carbon results. ORIS supports tonnes, cubic metres, square metres, linear metres, and pieces.
By default, ORIS pre-selects a unit and conversion factor for each material based on the default configuration of the selected library. If the user changes the unit selection and it matches the emission factor unit, the conversion factor is set to 1 automatically. If the units differ, ORIS flags the mismatch and requires a conversion factor before the assessment can proceed.
Each material is pre-classified as Material In, Material Out, or In Situ. This classification can be modified manually and determines how the material is treated in the life cycle stage breakdown within the Results Dashboard:
• Material In: Material sourced and delivered to the project site, such as aggregate, asphalt, or concrete. This is the most common classification.
• Material Out: Material extracted or removed from the project, such as excavated soil or demolished pavement. Transport for Material Out flows away from the site.
• In Situ: Material already in place that requires only on-site processing or installation, such as soil in place that requirements compaction. No inbound transport is calculated for In Situ materials; only the associated construction operations contribute to the carbon footprint.
Tip
Where material specifications are not yet confirmed, use materials that conservatively overestimate embodied carbon. Values can be updated once procurement decisions are made. Omitting uncertain materials understates the result.
TRANSPORT METHOD
Select the transport method for the assessment. Two options are available, each suited to a different stage of design maturity. Cost inputs are optional throughout both methods.
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Manual Distance
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Supplier-Based
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For Manual Distance, click Transportation on each material line to review and adjust the default values for mode, transport type, and distance.
• Click Add Transport to define additional legs for multimodal supply chains.
• Cost per tonne-kilometre is optional.
CONSTRUCTION OPERATIONS
Construction operations are added at material level and account for the carbon footprint and cost of material handling, placement, and installation on site. They are optional but important for a complete picture of the construction stage.
ORIS provides a default library focused on road and pavement engineering. The library includes equipment-based entries with default productivity and fuel consumption values. These values can be modified to reflect project-specific conditions:
• Equipment name: Editable to match the specific plant being used.
• Productivity: Adjust to reflect actual on-site rates.
• Energy type and consumption: Modify to match measured values.
Custom operation libraries can be created at organisation level and reused across assessments, providing consistency and saving setup time on future projects.
Note
Cost values within construction operations are optional. If cost tracking is not part of the assessment scope, these fields can be left blank without affecting carbon results.
Important
Where the material unit in the BoQ differs from the operation's productivity unit, the material quantity for that operation line must be entered by the user.
Step 3: Site Selection (Supplier-Based Transport only)
Step 3 applies only when Supplier-Based transport is selected in Step 2. For each material, define the search parameters and confirm which supplier or suppliers to use.
SEARCH PARAMETERS
• Search radius: Set the maximum distance from the project location within which ORIS searches for production sites. Start with a realistic radius based on your knowledge of the supply market; if no suppliers are found, widen it incrementally.
• Site type filter: Filter by production site category, such as quarry, asphalt plant, or concrete batching plant, to narrow results to relevant suppliers.
• Truck parameters: Configure truck type and capacity to reflect the logistics planned for the project. These settings affect the transport carbon and cost calculations.
Important
If the material unit is anything other than tonnes (m³, m², or linear metres), ORIS does not provide a default truck load. Users must enter the truck load in the same unit as the material before running the calculation.
REVIEWING AND CONFIRMING SUPPLIERS SELECTION
Once the search runs, ORIS returns a list of identified suppliers matching the search criteria with the following indicators for each:
• Total transport carbon and cost: The embodied carbon and cost contribution from transporting this material from the candidate site to the project.
• One-way distance and travel time: The estimated road distance and time between the supplier and the project location.
• Approximate round trips per day: A logistics indicator to understand supply chain feasibility.
Confirm supplier selections using the checkbox in the list view or by clicking sites directly on the map. Additional filtering and sorting options are available in the panel. To adjust search settings, click Modify My Search in the upper-left panel and re-run the calculation.
Selecting more than one supplier for a material displays a range of results for the affected indicators in the Results Dashboard, allowing you to see the impact of different sourcing decisions.
Note
The suppliers identified in ORIS do not necessarily confirm actual material availability. They are intended as a spatial proxy to support more accurate transport distance assumptions based on local context, or to document and justify the assumptions used in reporting.
Important
If no site is found within the search radius, ORIS blocks the calculation for that material. Either widen the radius, or switch to Manual Distance and enter a conservative average transport distance until a supplier is confirmed.
The Results Dashboard
Once all required steps are complete, ORIS generates the Results Dashboard showing total embodied carbon and cost, broken down by BoQ structure and life cycle stages. Charts are interactive.
The dashboard mirrors the group-material hierarchy of the assessment. Select any group or subgroup to drill into it and view the breakdown at the next level of detail, down to individual materials.
The Compare Results button redirects to the Comparison Dashboard, which displays all Material Assessments in the active Workspace side by side. Within the Comparison Dashboard, results can be filtered to include only the assessments relevant to the comparison.
Tip
To compare design options with identical quantities but different material specifications, duplicate the base assessment and update only the material selection. Groups, quantities, units, conversion factors, and transport settings are all carried over automatically.
Important
In the Comparison Dashboard, the baseline for comparison is always the assessment from which the Comparison Dashboard was opened. It is identified by a distinctive colour and a star marker.
Duplicating an Assessment
Any Material Assessment can be duplicated from the Workspace view. To do so, click the three vertical dots next to the relevant assessment in the list and select Duplicate. A new window will then open, allowing you to edit the name of the duplicate and choose the workspace in which it should be created. The duplicate carries over the full BoQ structure, including:
• All groups and sub-groups with their names and reference numbers.
• All material selections, quantities, units, and conversion factors.
• All transport settings, including method, mode, distance, and truck parameters.
• All construction operations.
The name in Step 1 is the only thing to update before the duplicate becomes a separate, independent assessment. This makes it fast to model alternative designs or specification scenarios without rebuilding the structure from scratch.