Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) can be a valuable tool, helping housebuilders and developers to make more informed choices.
Here, Jonathan Lynch, UK Building Products Manager at EGGER UK, explains the difference between Industry Average / Sector and Product-specific EPDs when it comes to chipboard-based structural flooring products and the value that this information can provide.
With homeowners and consumers more environmentally focused than ever, the topic of sustainability is increasingly important, putting extra pressure on housebuilders and developers. As such, they’re looking for manufacturers who are prioritising the reduction of their carbon footprint and contributing to Net Zero. The challenge is that the market is full of sustainability claims, some robust, others far less so. This greenwashing creates confusion for housebuilders and homeowners alike.
This is where EPDs can be valuable tools, with manufacturers sharing transparent, accessible and traceable product data, that can allow for more informed specifications to be made. However, not all EPDs are the same. Some are more generic and can cover multiple ranges or collections within a single EPD document, while others are focused on a specific product.
Industry Average or Sector EPDs
Industry Average / Sector EPDs bring together data from multiple manufacturers to show the environmental profile of a typical product within a category, while Group EPDs cover a manufacturer’s wider product family under one declaration. These documents are still valid and independently verified however, because they draw on pooled or averaged data, they provide only a general overview rather than the environmental performance of an individual product.
Product-specific EPDs
Product-specific EPDs look at the life-cycle environmental impact of one product, from the raw materials used to how it is manufactured, transported, installed and eventually disposed of. As a result, these EPDs can be more representative when comparing with the product configuration, plant and supply route that is being purchased. It’s this level of detail that is increasingly valued by specifiers and schemes such as BREEAM and LEED, which often give greater recognition to product level data.
Product-specific EPDs must be third-party verified and typically have a defined validity period, with the caveat that they must be reviewed and updated when there are material changes to the product. Having this type of EDP can showcase commitment to transparency, providing housebuilders and developers with the data they need during the specification process and helping them to achieve enhanced sustainability out on site.
How to use EPDs responsibly?
At their core, EPDs provide quantified environmental impact data, best viewed as a transparent tool that supports evidence-based specification and whole-building assessment. They should not be viewed as a blanket claim or “proving” sustainability.
In practice, comparing EPDs can be tricky if the scope (for example, taking into account A1-A3 or A1-C plus D) or the methodology differs. It’s encouraged to carry out like-for-like comparisons when reviewing EPDs, noting differences in scope, transport assumptions and end-of-life assumptions – to name a few.
Delivering sustainability
While EPDs are a fantastic tool to enable more informed specification decisions and refine product choices, in turn contributing to a greener project further down the line, perhaps the biggest carbon wins continue to stem from design efficiency and waste reduction.
At EGGER, sustainability is at the core of everything we do, with a significant amount of recycled wood used within our production processes, in addition to sawmill by-products, facilitating material circularity. Recognising the need for increased transparency surrounding these manufacturing processes and the products themselves, we have a series of Product-specific EPDs.