Taxonomy

Ensure nothing important is missed as you consider the scope of your assessment.

The DIST taxonomy is a standardised categorisation system for structuring impact estimates data across the whole digital life-cycle.

DIST's default taxonomy is extensible meaning it can be applied across multiple environment impact dimensions, although carbon is the most fully formed as present. Water, health and critical minerals are amongst the other dimensions the DIST community wants to work on. We welcome contributions to improve all aspects of this work - see get involved.

Use the buttons below to toggle between the default taxonomy and versions tailored to specific impact dimensions the DIST community have worked on.

Available impact dimensions

• Default taxonomy
• Carbon
• Water
• Health

• The full, default taxonomy.

  Impact dimension: Default

  Category

  DIST Category

  Upstream Impacts

  Category U

  The embodied impacts of hardware, the development of software, content & data.

  Software

  Off The Shelf including AI models

  Hardware Manufacture, Transport and Installation

  Employee Hardware

  Networking Hardware

  Servers and Storage Hardware

  Content & Data

  Content and Data

  Operational Impacts

  Operational impacts are associated with the running of business IT functions and systems. Each operational function may have a hybrid of IT infrastructure across direct and/or indirect impacts.

  Direct

  Category O

  Direct running costs that are attributed to directly operating servers, networks and devices.

  Employee Devices

  Networking and Infrastructure

  Servers and Storage

  ---

  Category G

  Generators

  Indirect

  Category C

  Indirect running impacts that are attributed to external hardware and service solutions.

  Cloud Services

  SaaS

  Managed Services

  Downstream Impacts

  Category D

  Impacts associated with the use of products and services produced by the business.

  End Use (B2B, B2C)

  End-User Devices

  Network Data Transfer

  Out of Scope

  People, Buildings and Travel

  Licensed via BY-SA 4.0

• A tailored view of the taxonomy to support categorising carbon emission impacts.

  Use this in conjunction with the carbon methodologies map and schema to estimate and share your digital estate's carbon emission information.

  Impact dimension: Carbon

  Category

  DIST Category

  1/2/3

  GHG Protocol Scope

  Upstream Impacts

  Category U

  3

  The embodied impacts of hardware, the development of software, content & data.

  Software

  Off The Shelf including AI models

  Hardware Manufacture, Transport and Installation

  Employee Hardware

  Networking Hardware

  Servers and Storage Hardware

  Content & Data

  Content and Data

  Operational Impacts

  Operational impacts are associated with the running of business IT functions and systems. Each operational function may have a hybrid of IT infrastructure across direct and/or indirect impacts.

  Direct

  Category O

  2

  Direct running costs that are attributed to directly operating servers, networks and devices.

  Employee Devices

  Networking and Infrastructure

  Servers and Storage

  ---

  Category G

  1

  Generators

  Indirect

  Category C

  3

  Indirect running impacts that are attributed to external hardware and service solutions.

  Cloud Services

  SaaS

  Managed Services

  Downstream Impacts

  Category D

  3

  Impacts associated with the use of products and services produced by the business.

  End Use (B2B, B2C)

  End-User Devices

  Network Data Transfer

  Out of Scope

  People, Buildings and Travel

  Licensed via BY-SA 4.0

• The DIST community are currently working to map the default taxonomy to water impacts.

  If you would like to contribute, please see the get involved page.

• The DIST community are currently working to map the default taxonomy to human health impacts.

  If you would like to contribute, please see the get involved page.