Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) are becoming increasingly employed by architects, engineers, product designers and construction firms. They are rapidly becoming a global phenomenon, with programs being implemented in Europe, North America, China, Australasia, Mexico, South America, the Middle East, and India. In particular, construction material manufacturers are seeing an upward trend in requests for EPDs from their customers.
EPDs offer transparent and valuable information on the environmental impacts of products. Implementing an EPD enables businesses to identify the areas for improvement, therefore helping them to achieve their Science Based Targets. This blog post will explore what an EPD is, why you should care about them, and the process behind creating them.
What Are EPDs?
An EPD is an independently verified report that demonstrates all of the environmental impacts of a product across its lifecycle. They are becoming more and more popular in today’s climate. Importantly, it details the specific stages of a product’s lifecycle:
- Resources and Material Extraction
- Processing
- Manufacturing
- Distribution
- Use and End of Cycle
- Recycling, Landfill, Disposal etc.
EPDs analyse the carbon footprint of your products, your resource use (e.g water, energy, raw materials), the air, water and soil emissions, as well as waste generation. They are viewed as one of the most trusted proof points for product carbon footprints.
Who Uses EPDs?
- Architects
- Engineers
- Construction firms
- Procurement teams
- Product designers
- ESG and sustainability professionals
Why Should You Care About EPDs?
EPDs greatly support carbon reduction targets by enabling comparisons between different products and their environmental impact. Effectively, this comparison helps businesses select the most sustainable option for buildings or infrastructure. EPDs are also a valuable tool for companies to assess how their product purchases affect the environment, and evaluate how they can make sustainable changes in order to achieve their Net Zero targets.
Why Should You Do An EPD?
- Sustainability is now business-critical.
- Clients, regulators, and stakeholders ask for proof.
- EPDs are one of the most trusted proof points for product carbon footprints.
- EPDs are applicable to the construction industry.
What Is The Role Of An EPD?
An EPD has a variety of different roles including:
- Acting as a transparency and disclosure tool.
- Acting as a trustbuilding tool for your brand.
- Acting as a comparison tool during design and product purchasing decisions.
- Benefiting your brand reputation.
- Forcing you to acknowledge where the problems in the products lie, and what can be improved about them.
How Are EPDs Completed?
- Firstly, a Lifecycle Assessment (LCA) is done, and this can be completed using a carbon accounting platform. For example, with Enistic, you can use the ‘Easy EPD System’ to complete this stage.
- Afterwards, your carbon consultant reviews and verifies the data.
- Then, your carbon accounting platform (such as Enistic) gets the data verified against Product Category Rules (PCRs).
- Your carbon platform will publish your EPD in the centralised EPD databases.
- The EPD will be refreshed every 5 years max.
How Are EPDs Verified?
- Systems such as Easy EPD with Enistic includes sourcing and interfacing with an independent third party review.
- They then audit the LCA data.
- The data is checked for adherence to PCR.
- The EPD is signed off.
- There is an additional fee to pay for this service, depending on who is appointed to verify.
Carbon consultants can give guidance on verifiers as they can vary between each other. The EPD verification process can take anywhere between 6 weeks (if done quickly) or up to 4 to 5 months.
Where To Start?
Though the process can seem overwhelming, once you break it down, an EPD is easy to get started with.
- Firstly, identify your products which need an EPD. Start with your most popular product if you are struggling to decide.
- Next, sign up to Easy EPD and get onboarded onto the Enistic platform.
- Work with your carbon consultant to identify the relevant PCRs.
- Then, start creating your LCA.
Why Should You Create An EPD?
There are a variety of benefits of creating an EPD. These include:
- Winning bids.
- Meeting client demands.
- Differentiating your products and making more sustainable choices.
- Preparing for future regulations.
- Increasing stakeholder engagement.
- Increasing brand transparency.
To Summarise…
To recap, an Environmental Product Declaration is a verified document containing data for products in order to assess their environmental impact. They are great for trust, compliance and market differentiation.
In a world where business sustainability is becoming more and more crucial, an EPD is one of the best ways a business can reach their Net Zero and Science Based Targets.
If you would like more information on EPDs, don’t hesitate to get in touch with us.