Principally the procedure of producing EPD and the required content of an EPD are regulated in ISO 14025 “Environmental labels and declarations – Type III environmental declarations – Principles and procedures” as well as in EN 15804 “Sustainability of construction works – environmental product declarations. Core rules for the product category of construction products”.
Procedure in detail
Flowchart “procedure” in pdf-Format
In a 5-stage procedure the following topics are dealt with:
Preliminary discussion
The preliminary discussion gives information to the potetioal EPD Creator. Contact persons are the managing director of the
Bau EPD GmbH supported by representatives of the expert committee. In most cases questions of methodology and technical approaches are discussed and a rought cost frame is estimated. The core part of an EPD – the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is not created by the
Bau EPD GmbH. Therefore we suggest to invite an expert of LCA pracitioning to the preliminary discussion.
List of LCA practitioners registered at the Bau EPD GmbH
Creation of the PCR-guidelines
In the process of creation of an EPD two technical documents are used. They build the frame of regulation in the EPD programme. B
General Principles and LCA-Calculation Rules (short: PCR Part A)
PCR Part A gives details to the content of the standard EN 15804 and describes the requirements on the project report and calculation rulef for the LCA-production necessary for creating the EPD. PCR Part A is applicable on all construction products and must be considered on a mandatory basis.
Specific PCR-guidelines (short: PCR Part B)
In the specific PCR-guidelines product-related determinations for products of a defined range are regulated. This documents give e.g. information about lists of technical features that must be declared or which documentation is required on aspects of environmental and health protection.
If the preliminary discussion shows that a specific PCR-guideline for the product in question is still to be developed, this procedure is the next step.
The PCR-guidelines are developed by members of the PCR-Gremium who are supported by producers of the product category in question and -if needed- external experts.
Subsequently the PCR is published on the internet and all interested parties are invited to join the process of PCR-creation and send their comments to the programme operator.
The draft is sent one more time to the PCR-Gremium to be checked and verified. After the final approval the PCR-guideline can be used to create EPD.
Preparation of the LCA (Life Cycle Assessment)
In nearly all cases the creation of an EPD is fulfilled by the producer together with an expert of LCA-practice and sometimes also testing institutes are involved. Usually the development of the EPD can be started in a parallel process to the creation of the PCR-guidelines.
Tasks of the producers
The producer of a construction material must offer all information needed for the LCA (data collection). In many cases also parts of the text of the EPD are formulated by the producer. This shall soon be possible over a data base system. At the moment the texts still have to be entered into forms. The modelling of the LCA as well as the preparation of the project report are usually not done by the producer because for that special software products and very specific and detailled knowledge about LCA is necessary.
Tasks of the LCA-practitioner
The LCA-practitioner creates the LCA-model, interprets and describes the backround data and produces the project report to the EPD. Sometimes also the texts for the EPD are created by the LCA-practitioner and then passed to the Bau EPD GmbH for verification.
List of LCA practitioners registered at the Bau EPD GmbH
Third party verification
The verification by individual external verifiers (“Third party verification) is next to the service of the PCR-Gremium the most important measure to assure quality. With that the highest quality, transparency and credibility of the documents published can be guaranteed. All verifiers are LCA-experts with indepth knowledge of the standards and requirements considering EPD development.
List of individual independent verifiers
Publication
After successful verification the EPD document is published on the website and in the data base system and can be downloaded by the public.
Fees for verification and declaration of the Bau EPD GmbH
