Program Operators Guide

Executive Summary

The ECO Portal is transitioning from a monolithic, software-dependent model to a decentralized, API-first architecture. This shift empowers Program Operators (POs) by providing full ownership and flexibility over their own infrastructure while ensuring long-term stability for the ECO Platform ecosystem.

Key Strategic Benefits

  • Ownership: POs have the freedom to choose their preferred software stack, ensuring they maintain control over their data and infrastructure.
  • Flexibility: The API-first approach allows for easier integration with existing systems and future-proofs the platform against technological shifts.
  • Scalability: By decentralizing data hosting, the ECO Portal can scale more effectively to accommodate the growing volume of EPDs.

Business Requirements

To maintain a cohesive ecosystem, all PO Nodes must adhere to core business requirements:

  1. Uniformity: Consistent API structure across all participants.
  2. Data Exposure: Secure and reliable exposure of EPD data via standardized formats.
  3. Reliability: Implementation of health-check patterns to ensure ecosystem-wide availability.

For more details on our broader vision, see the Digital Strategy.

The ECO Portal ecosystem relies on a decentralized architecture where Program Operators (PO) maintain their own data nodes. This guide outlines the business and technical requirements for integrating a PO Node with the ECO Portal.

The PO-to-Portal Contract

  • Uniformity: Regardless of the internal technology used by a Program Operator, the external-facing API must follow a unified structure.
  • Data Exposure: PO Nodes must expose EPDs via UUIDs and provide a search index for EPDs.
  • Reliability: Nodes must include health-check patterns to allow the ECO Portal to monitor availability.

Technical Integration Guide

To participate in the ECO Platform ecosystem, your PO Node must expose a set of API endpoints. These endpoints allow the ECO Portal to discover, crawl, and retrieve EPD data in the standardized ILCD format.

Required API Endpoints

Default (soda4LCA-compatible) endpoints

By default, the ECO Portal’s Search Worker polls PO Nodes using the soda4LCA-compatible endpoints. If your node runs soda4LCA — or implements the same API shape — no extra work is needed; these endpoints are already implemented in the soda4LCA API:

  • GET /resource/processes — search endpoint polled by the portal’s Search Worker
  • GET /resource/processes/{epd_uuid} — retrieve a single EPD document
  • GET /nodeinfo — node information
  • GET /healthz — health check used by the portal to monitor your node’s availability

Alternative draft endpoints

The draft PO Node specification also defines the following endpoints. They are supported as an alternative and can be configured per node via the node metadata (endpoints.search, endpoints.get, endpoints.health):

  • GET /v1/epds
  • GET /v1/epds/{epd_uuid}
  • GET /v1/healthz

If you implement these instead of the soda4LCA-compatible endpoints, register the custom paths with the ECO Platform team when submitting your Node Base URL.

Integration Checklist

Use this checklist to ensure your PO Node is “ECO Portal Ready”:

  • Implement Mandatory Endpoints: Ensure all /v1 endpoints are functional.
  • ILCD Compliance: Verify that the data returned by GET /v1/epds/{epd_uuid} follows the ILCD+EPD schema and ECO Platform DDR.
  • Health Check: Ensure /healthz reflects the actual state of your data service.
  • Registration: Submit your Node Base URL to it@eco-platform.org for inclusion in the ECO Portal.

API Reference