Autodesk Launches New Fusion Add-on to Overcome Data Accessibility Challenges of Sustainable Product Design

According to data from the World Economic Forum (WEF), manufacturing accounted for around 20% of global Carbon Dioxide (CO2) and approximately 54% of energy consumption. Consequently, the manufacturing sector is under the spotlight with urgent demand to reduce its environmental impact, as legislative pressures and stakeholder influence mean sustainability initiatives can no longer be delayed.

Traditionally, the major challenge for achieving optimization and efficiency improvements in the manufacturing sector has been a lack of or misuse of data to monitor operations, as companies are not able to optimize what they cannot track. This challenge remains the case for sustainability within manufacturing and highlights the need for data-driven decisions to ensure meaningful sustainable improvements to manufacturing operations and product design. In response to this barrier to more environmentally-conscious manufacturing, Autodesk announced the launch of Manufacturing Sustainability Insights (MSI), a data tool helping users discover the carbon impacts of design decisions.

The MSI tool is an add-on feature for Autodesk Fusion in partnership with Gravity Climate, an end-to-end carbon accounting and energy management platform. Gravity Climate’s Carbon Management solution eliminates manual carbon data collection and measurement with automated data management and audit-ready reporting. Via its Application Programming Interface (API), Gravity Climate enables companies to utilize real-time sustainability data to enhance product design and drive a sustainable impact.

Since early 2024, Autodesk has been leveraging Gravity Climate’s API to bridge the gap by providing up-to-date carbon data within Fusion that enable users to intuitively determine how different design decisions will impact the carbon footprint of a product before it is manufactured. MSI calculations provided by Gravity Climate use the latest climate science and the most granular, transparent carbon data available, based on manufacturing processes, location, and material use. The MSI tool offers real-time visibility into the carbon impact of various design options, giving users the immediate ability to identify and test alternative design options to reduce the product’s carbon footprint.

The introduction of MSI to Autodesk Fusion is the latest addition to a growing list of third-party applications, enabling its customers to integrate sustainability into the design process. Over the last couple of years, the company has integrated various other sustainable design applications in partnership with companies such as Makersite and SimaPro, giving product designers the necessary tools and insight to make environmentally responsible choices. The application with Makersite, for example, enables users to convert a Computer-Aided Design (CAD) model into Bill of Materials (BOM), leveraging the Makersite platform to calculate climate impacts and cost estimates of the BOM.

Despite 80% of a product’s carbon footprint being determined at the design phase, companies have historically not had access to robust data that facilitate sustainable design choices, making MSI a vital tool for overcoming this challenge. With more stringent regulations on sustainable design and emissions disclosure looming, manufacturers are now in a position where maximizing visibility to understand a product’s environmental impact from cradle to gate is essential. By making better decisions in the design phase, companies can optimize resource use and processes prior to manufacturing, thus saving time and costs. The capabilities of MSI will also be vital tools supporting compliance requirements for global Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) regulations. Facilitating the tracking of information related to a product’s sustainability credentials, including Scope 3 emissions, will aid the measurement and reporting of environmental data disclosures to validate green claims.

The partnership between Autodesk and Gravity Climate sets a precedent for the rest of the manufacturing industry, highlighting that data accessibility and collaboration are the foundational pillars to enable a future of sustainable product design. MSI is currently accessible as a third-party add-on free of charge for Autodesk Fusion customers, providing a cost-effective way for companies to improve product sustainability. However, as sustainable design continues to become more of a necessity than a choice, similar functionalities may be fully integrated into design platforms, rather than third-party features. Autodesk should look to permanently integrate these features into their software solutions to remain competitive with others in the industry that are already doing so.