IS Materials Calculator Update
stEPD up: IS Materials Calculator – ‘+A1/+A2 EPD Update’ – related to new EPD Standard
The Infrastructure Sustainability Materials Calculator (IS Materials Calculator) provides a level playing field assessment tool for materials lifecycle impacts across different infrastructure projects and assets.
As stated in the ISC December 2022 article IS-Materials-Calculator-Update.pdf , the EPD standard (EN15804) underwent a major amendment (EN15804+A2) in October 2019 (from EN15804+A1), which resulted in an expanded set of environmental indicators to be reported in EPDs. See Table 1 below for an overview of the different environmental indicators.
The current IS Materials Calculator only includes results from EPDs published to the earlier standard (EN15804+A1).
- We note that many of our members have existing EPDs published to EN15804+A1, which are well within their 5-year validity period (with the final ones to expire in February 2027).
- The ISC needs to continue supporting these existing EPDs, and any change in the current methodology or process must take this into consideration.
Table 1: Environmental impact indicators in EN 15804 + A1 and EN 15804 + A2
EN 15804 + A1 Indicators
EN 15804 + A2 Indicators
Additional indicators
The ISC, our Sustainable Materials Technical Working Group and Tool Developers have been working hard to develop a solution to update the IS Materials Calculator to enable it to include both types of EPDs (i.e. EN15804+A1 & EN15804+A2) within a combined calculation methodology and produce a single consolidated result output, for the purposes of an IS Rating.
IS Materials Calculator – ‘+A1/+A2 EPD Update’: Proposed Solution
The proposed solution is to create a single comprehensive tool that covers both EN15804+A1 and EN15804+A2 life cycle inventory results, across both Australia and New Zealand. This plan of work will merge all four of the below tool requirements into a single tool (IS Materials Calculator – ‘+A1/+A2 EPD Update’) with a simple and user-friendly user interface:
- Australian dataset for +A1 reporting
- Australian dataset for +A2 reporting
- New Zealand dataset for +A1 reporting
- New Zealand dataset for +A2 reporting
The newly updated ISC Materials Calculator will merge all the requirements into the one tool and provide users the ability to continue to report their +A1 results, as well as meet their emerging +A2 reporting requirements.
- Tool Developers – Michel Consulting & Enterprises; start2see
- Program – proposed to be finalised in December 2023
Note: Digitilisation of the current IS Materials Calculator is occurring in parallel (scheduled for completion in early 2024). The intent is to firstly develop the Materials Calculator – ‘+A1/+A2 EPD update’ in excel, and then make the relevant changes in the digital tool, once it has been tested by the industry.
IS Materials Calculator – ‘+A1/+A2 EPD Update’: Tool Development Sponsors
The infrastructure sector will benefit greatly from this important update, made possible through collaboration and partnership. The ISC would like to thank the below members for stepping up and sponsoring the IS Materials Calculator – ‘+A1/+A2 EPD Update’
Major Sponsor
Associate Sponsor
Current Workarounds
As this is a considerable update, material manufacturers are advised as follows:
For ‘EPDs produced in line with EPD Australasia Standards’
- To be added to the IS Materials Calculator, the product needs a valid EPD that includes the EN15804+A1 set of results (i.e. EPDs published to EN15804+A2 will need to also contain the EN15804+A1 results). As outlined in the IS Material Calculator Guideline & recommended by EPD Australasia Technical Guidance (December 2020)
Note: There is no change to other requirements, i.e. the EPD Programme Operator needs to be categorised as an Established Programme Operator by ECO Platform. EPD Australasia is an Established Programme Operator through its affiliation with the International EPD System.
For ‘EPDs produced internationally by recognised third parties’
- To be added to the IS Materials Calculator, the product needs a valid EPD that either includes the EN15804+A1 and/or the EN15804+A2 set of results. If the EPD only contains the EN15804+A2 results, the EPD owner needs to provide the EN15804+A1 results in Excel format to the ISC (to be sense checked by the ISC/ISC consultant) and written confirmation that the EN15804+A1 and +A2 results were generated together for the same product.
For ‘EPDs produced by GCCA software’ (i.e. only capable of producing +A2 results)
- Not able to be included in the current IS Materials Calculator