Understanding APIs in the context of corporate sustainability

Understanding APIs in the context of corporate sustainability. What are APIs? Why are APIs useful for sustainability data challenges?

1. Introduction

Sustainability challenges inside companies increasingly come down to data. Leaders need to know how much carbon their operations produce, what portion of energy use comes from renewables, or whether their suppliers meet environmental and social standards. Yet the reality is that this information is often scattered across systems, locked inside PDFs, or updated far too slowly to be useful for decision-making.

This is where APIs—Application Programming Interfaces—come in. They may not sound exciting, but they provide the invisible infrastructure that allows sustainability data to move quickly, securely, and in a standardized format.

For companies under pressure to comply with regulations, satisfy investors, and act on climate goals, APIs are an essential tool.

In this article, you will learn:

✅ What an API is
✅ Why APIs are useful for sustainability data challenges
✅ The benefits and challenges of using APIs in a corporate sustainability strategy

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2. What is an API?

An API is like a translator or “messenger” that lets two pieces of software talk to each other. Instead of building everything from scratch, developers can use APIs to connect to existing data or services.

Everyday example: When you check the weather on your phone, the app sends a request to a weather service’s API with details like your location and the data you want (e.g., hourly temperature). The service processes that request—often by querying databases and forecast models—and returns only the data you asked for, in a structured format (usually JSON).

Think of an API like a restaurant workflow.

• Menu = API documentation (what you can ask for and how).

• Your order = the request (with options/parameters).

• Waiter = the API endpoint that receives your order.

• Kitchen = the back-end service that prepares the result (it may use a database as ingredients).

• Served dish = the response returned to you.

You don’t walk into the kitchen to cook; you follow the menu and place an order through the waiter. Likewise, apps don’t dig around in someone else’s database; they use the API to request exactly what they need.

Example

If you want to retrieve data you send something that is called a GET request:

GET https://api.open-meteo.com/v1/forecast?latitude=52.37&longitude=4.90&hourly=temperature_2m

You are asking:
“Give me the hourly temperature in Amsterdam (lat 52.37, lon 4.90).”

If you submitted the request successfully (HTTP 200), you get a response like this:

{
  "latitude": 52.37,
  "longitude": 4.90,
  "generationtime_ms": 0.221,
  "utc_offset_seconds": 0,
  "timezone": "GMT",
  "hourly": {
    "time": [
      "2025-09-20T09:00",
      "2025-09-20T10:00"
    ],
    "temperature_2m": [
      17.2,
      18.0
    ]
  }
}

In other words, the API replies:
“At 09:00 UTC it’s 17.2°C, at 10:00 UTC it will be 18.0°C.”

The app does not need to know the science of weather prediction. It only needs to know how to ask the question and interpret the structured answer. This same principle applies when the question is about emissions, supplier compliance, or energy flows.

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3. Two examples of APIs in sustainability

Carbon footprint tracking

APIs can make scope 2 emissions calculations much more accurate. Normally, companies add up their electricity use (kWh) from electricity bills over a month or