The ecoinvent database in Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs)
Currently, the increasing and efficient practice of Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) in the construction and manufacturing sector requires standardized, accurate, non-misleading communication of environmental information. As such, international standards like ISO 14025 and ISO 21930, and the amended EN15804 standard (EN15804&A2:2019) for Europe, define the standardised format and nomenclature for the communication of data and the results of their use.
It is our vision that people worldwide have access to high-quality information to perform sustainability assessments easily and affordably. As the publisher of environmental information, we want to make sure that our products meet the requirements of widely recognised standards. Even more, we wish to offer our users data and information in formats that meet their needs and purposes. Therefore, the ecoinvent association is developing an additional system model to the ecoinvent database, dedicated to support the needs of EPD practitioners.
Specifically, the additional system model ‘Allocation, cut-off, EN15804’ adjusts all datasets included in the ecoinvent database to comply with the amended EN15804 standard (EN15804&A2:2019) and with ISO 14025 and ISO 21930. The system model has been developed according to guidelines of the Technical Committee CEN/TC 350 and the directive of the European Commission regarding the end-of-waste state. It includes inventory indicators describing resource use, waste categories and output flows, and information on biogenic carbon content, as well as a detailed overview of the assumptions and the calculation method for indicators. The calculation methodology for these indicators is developed by the ecoinvent team and Chris Foster, accredited verifier for the International EPD® System and for EPD Ireland, and is documented in detail. As such, the system model not only facilitates an easier, standard-compliant EPD practice, but also further promotes harmonization in the calculation of the indicators of the standard and supports accurate comparability of the results. In addition, the datasets in this system model can be provided in a format and nomenclature compliant with EN15804&A2:2019.
The ‘Allocation, cut-off, EN15804’ system model will soon be available as an add-on to licence holders of the ecoinvent database.
Use of the ecoinvent EN15804 data is subject to the Terms of Use of the End User Licence Agreement and the Addendum.
What does the version number of the database mean?
What is an activity in ecoinvent version 3?
What are global background activities and where do they come from?
What is a market and how is it created?
In which situations are direct activity links used?
Why is the reference product of the treatment activities negative?
Why is the amount of the reference product changing?
What is linking and what happens during the linking process? Attributional System Model
What is linking and what happens during the linking process? Consequential System Model
What is allocation at the point of substitution (APOS)?
What do the shortcuts, such as CH, RER, RoW and GLO mean?
What does it mean, when the production volume of an activity is zero?
Why is the “Allocation, default” system model not available in the ecoquery anymore?
How do I calculate the amount of transport in the market?
What is the Rest-of-the-World (RoW) and how is it calculated?
Why is the LCIA score of a certain product negative?
What are the UUID numbers and how do they work?
How to interpret the uncertainty fields in ecoinvent?
What are the LCIA methods ecoinvent is publishing the impact assessment results for?
APOS: why do I have carrots on my recycled aluminium?