With a focus on sustainable construction, SMET provides EPDs for a diverse range of building materials, including baseTherm®– Ireland’s only NSAI accredited BEPS liquid floor insulation.
Sustainable construction trends have driven the demand for environmental product declarations (EPDs) for building products.
In many building certification systems, the criteria for evaluating sustainability include a standardised, systematic life-cycle assessment (LCA), which – as the name suggests – covers a building’s entire lifespan.
The data used in these assessments is based on EPDs prepared in accordance with international standards ISO 14025 and EN 15804. EPDs contain statements on the energy and resource use as well as the extent to which a product contributes to the greenhouse effect, acidification, eutrophication, destruction of the ozone layer and smog formation.
They also include details of the technical properties needed to assess the performance of a particular product in the building, such as in terms of service life or impact on indoor air quality.
Remember a product with an EPD is not automatically a product with low environmental impact – the EPD only provides the environmental information about the product, which allows you to discover this by comparing it to other products at the building level. However, in obtaining an EPD, the manufacturer will receive an EPD Project Report, which explains the sources of impacts through the life cycle, which will allow them to consider how they might best reduce these. For designers and specifiers, EPDs have a major role to play in enabling better product choices in delivering lower carbon buildings.
Download EPDs
SMET has made it easier to access EPDs for your projects and is delighted to offer a comprehensive listing for a range of its superior German-made materials including screeds, tiling, renders, plasters, primers and sealers.
These EPDs are available now, free for download on the ‘EPD Ireland’ programme – Ireland’s go-to Environmental Product Declaration platform. To access these third party verified EPDs, open the platform: www.igbc.ie/epd and search for ‘SMET’.
The IGBC (Irish Green Building Council) developed the EPD Ireland programme. This allows Irish producers to create an Environmental Product Declaration for their product, using Product Category Rules (PCR) for Ireland and have it verified and published on the platform. EPD Ireland also allows manufacturers to upload EPD from other programme operators on its website, as is the case above.
EPD Alliance
SMET is a member of the Alliance for Sustainable Building Products (ASBP), and is listed in the new ASBP Members’ platform of published EPDs. This database showcases a curated selection of EPDs for ASBP members’ building products.The building products specialist is also a member of the Association for Environment Conscious Building (AECB), can be found listed in the Passive House Plus members directory, Marketplace Plus, and is currently working toward BES 6001 accreditation in 2023.
Contact ISO 14001 accredited SMET now, for further information when choosing materials with EPDs for your low carbon project.
