Environmental Product Declarations - The importance of climate-based metrics for production and purchasing

Abstract

The rising importance and urgency of climate change have created a need for comparison between products based on their climate impact. While there are various metrics by which to do this, such as global warming potential (GWP), and methodologies for how to quantify those metrics through lifecycle assessments (LCAs), environmental product declarations (EPDs) fulfill an important niche in making the calculated impacts of products directly comparable. EPDs are based on LCA data, with additional requirements determined based on the specific products they describe. There are a variety of incentives that have been put in place to encourage the use of EPDs, including EPD requirements for municipal construction projects. Several tools have been created to ease the adoption of EPDs through lowering costs and simplifying the creation process. As with all things, EPDs have some shortcomings, but they are manageable, and to help address those issues and build upon their strengths, various additional resources should be provided including better organization of EPD information, more municipal and state EPD requirements or bid incentives, and subsidies for companies taking on the additional cost of EPD creation.

There has been some movement recently in the low embodied carbon concrete space in the Ann Arbor area through a task force made up of a series of local companies in construction and construction-adjacent areas, including the Global CO2 Initiative. This task force has designed and implemented a slag cement-based concrete mix with a significant GWP reduction. Further research into the possibility of an EPD for this locally created mix is currently underway with the hopes that adoption in the South East Michigan area, along with the potential future creation of local EPD incentives, could help spread the practice further.