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By 2026, more and more companies will have to publish their own sustainability report. Rinnen Group, headquartered in Moers, Germany, has already embarked on this journey – and gained valuable insights along the way. The transport and logistics industry is facing a new wave of regulation. The background to this is the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), which requires companies above a certain size to disclose their sustainability figures and strategies in the same detail as their financial reporting.

Reason enough for Rinnen to tackle the topic of CSRD as early as 2025 for the previous 2024 reporting year, even though the freight forwarder will not have to submit the sustainability report until 2026 due to the size of the company. It has the support of Shipzero to do this. “In retrospect, it was good that we were so early,” emphasises Schulz. “The topic of CSRD is very complex and a heavy additional burden”.

An important prerequisite for the report is the so-called materiality analysis that a reporting company has to carry out. “It is the basis for our sustainability strategy and, in this respect, is decisive for the standards on which we have to report on,” explains Schulz. The first step is to collect a lot of environmental, social and governance (ESG) data: For the materiality analysis, we need to show not only how our own activities affect the environment or society, but also how our stakeholders with whom we work in the value chain are doing. The second step is to the materiality analysis, i.e. how environmental and social issues could affect the company and its future development.

Six employees – one goal: CSRD sustainability reporting

In order to implement this analysis in line with CSRD, Rinnen has already set up a project team with six employees from IT, Human Resources, Technical Services, EHSQ (Environment, Health, Safety and Quality), Operations and Accounting. “But we still have a lot of work to do and some stakeholders to talk to. The next few months will be intensive in this respect,” says Schulz. “However, we will be able to complete our dual materiality analysis by May at the latest.” Based on this, the company will identify the relevant data points from the European Sustainability Reporting Standard (ESRS) and then begin preparing the report.

When it comes to environmental issues, the Rinnen forwarder has Shipzero on board as a specialist. The company has developed a digital platform for calculating and reporting emissions data. “We couldn’t have done it on our own,” says Schulz. “We need service providers like Shipzero who specialise in this area.”

According to the 6e Directive, affected companies are obliged to “determine all greenhouse gas emissions from their main energy sources within their processes,” explains Martin Jacobs, who is responsible for customer management at Shipzero. Applied to the industry as a whole, this means that transport companies and freight forwarders must determine all the emissions that arise from the use of their vehicles. For example (Scope 1 emissions for own vehicles, Scope 3 for external service providers). But also the emissions caused by your company’s consumption of electricity, heating oil, gas, paper and water (Scope 2). The company must assess and document the CO2 emissions of the carriers it uses.

Data for CO2 reporting

To collect this data at Rinnen, Shipzero accesses the truck’s telematics via the fleet management interface (FMS). Based on the consumption data, Shipzero directly measures all emissions generated during transport, says Jacobs. “This is primarily primary data, not averages.” Shipzero does, however, use modelled data to determine the emissions generated by intermodal transport or by working with external carriers. The system determines these based on tonne-kilometres driven and other factors such as vehicle type or capacity utilisation. But the modelled data is also useful for the carrier, says Rinnen COO Michael Roth. Some of the intermodal providers the company works with for rail freight are not yet able to provide all the relevant emissions data.

“We already have all the emissions data for our own transports, as well as those of our forwarders and intermodal partners, and can compare them with the same period last year,” says Schulz. If necessary, Rinnen can break down the emissions data to individual shipments and even individual customer orders – regardless of whether the shipment was made by truck or rail. According to Jacobs, the measurements will become even more comprehensive. In the next step, Shipzero will include emissions from Rinnen’s logistics sites, such as electricity consumption and waste, in the course of 2025. “In the case of electricity, we use data from the electricity meter. For waste, for example, we use average values.” CEO Schulz: “It looks like we will have all the emissions data we need for our sustainability report in the second quarter of 2025.

The new CSRD sustainability reporting requirements

The European Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) imposes new obligations on companies. In a sustainability report, they must take into account ESG criteria from the areas of environment, social affairs and governance. The EU Directive has not yet been transposed into German law. They are therefore implemented (as of 2 February 2025, report from 2026).

The new reporting requirement applies retroactively to the 2025 reporting year for companies with a financial year starting in 2025 and at least 250 employees. Companies must have this report prepared by an auditor or have a balance sheet total of more than 50 million euros. Managing Director Schulz: Electricity consumption and waste. “In the second quarter of 2025, we will use data as it appears, i.e. all the data for our electricity meter. In the case of waste, for example, we use the emissions data required for our sustainability report”.

The last stage in sight

But Schulz is concerned: “We have to document not only the working conditions of our own employees, but also those of employees in upstream and downstream processes. In other words, if Rinnen uses external carriers, the company must document the working conditions of their employees accordingly. For the company’s own employees, the whole thing is easy to handle: “We access the personnel file for certain information, or we ask the employee briefly. As a member of the employers’ association, the company has access to all collective agreements anyway. “It is more difficult with external carriers,” admits COO Roth. “We can’t control whether their employees comply with driving and rest times. That is the responsibility of the carrier itself.”

Nevertheless, the driving and resting time data is transmitted directly to Rinnen, via the vehicle’s telematics system or via an app connection. Schulz emphasizes that it also helps that the company has integrated management systems in place: DIN ISO 9001, 50001, 14001 as well as SQAS and GMP+ B4. “That helps us. We can now draw a lot of data from these management systems, which is important for our CSRD reporting. But it will be a while before the sustainability report is ready: “There is still a lot of work to be done,” says Schulz. “We now have to prepare the data in a structured way to produce a report. And then the auditor will have to check it. All in all, he is confident: “We’re in the home stretch.”

Thomas Schulz, CEO of Rinnen Group

 

As a company, you will have to collect and document a lot of data for the sustainability report according to the European Sustainability Directive (CSRD) from 2026. As a medium-sized company, can you do this yourself or do you need consultants?

We can’t do this alone. CSRD is a very complex topic. In order to implement everything properly, you need external service providers like Shipzero who are specialized in this. And in the course of the CSRD process, we may also need other partners to help us further reduce our CO2 emissions, for example.

What is the biggest problem in implementing CSRD sustainability reporting?

The topic of CSRD is inherently a significant additional burden for a company. You don’t always have all the relevant data at your fingertips. Take, for example, electricity consumption in our workshops. But you can’t do that without electricity meters (laughs). So we’re in the process of installing them. The biggest challenge is that we often don’t have the data relevant to the sustainability report in one system, but in many different systems. And bringing that data together is no small feat.

For companies starting with CSRD sustainability reporting now, what advice do you have? Get started, preferably right away! Because this isn’t something that can be done casually. It takes time and people. Our project team alone has six members working on it since 2024.

 

 

Article published on 10 March 2025 in VerkehrsRundschau.

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