Chemical fingerprints enable environmental footprinting and optimization of feed procurement

Sustainable procurement is a critical leverage point for reducing the climate and biodiversity impacts of bio-based supply chains. Yet companies often lack rapid, batch-level data linking biomass origin and quality to environmental footprints and costs. Near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) with chemometrics is a rapid, non-destructive method commonly used to assess bio-based product quality and geographical origin. Here, we show how NIRS-based origin identification can be combined with spatially explicit life-cycle assessment to derive environmental footprints of bio-based supply chains. Using a Dutch feed production case study, we integrate the derived environmental footprints with quality measurements and ingredient-specific cost estimates to optimize across these indicators. We show that a balance can be struck where feed quality can be maintained with a minimal increase in costs (0.1%–1.0%) and a substantial reduction in climate (4.2%–9.5%) and land-based biodiversity (44.2%–50.3%) footprints. Together, these results show that routinely collected spectral data can support more actionable environmental footprinting in biomass procurement while explicitly balancing product quality, cost, climate impacts, and biodiversity impacts.