To help its members meet the requirements of LEED v4, NRMCA has sponsored a project to develop an industry wide Environmental Product Declaration (EPD). The first major milestone of the project, a survey report and list of participating companies and plants, are now available for download at www.nrmca.org/sustainability/EPDprogram. The project is being conducted in two phases:

Phase 1: A cradle to gate Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for ready mixed concrete will be conducted and an industry average EPD will be produced. The LCA and EPD will encompass concrete for a variety of applications, strengths, durability classes and slumps (or slump flows) and regions so that a participating producer could use the industry average EPD during the submittal process for a project requiring an EPD. The EPD will represent concrete typically used on a variety of projects from homes to high rises in different climate zones and different markets. For the EPD to meet the requirements of LEED v4 for submittal on a project, a concrete producer must participate in providing data to the LCA and be listed in the EPD.

Phase 2: Using data collected in Phase 1, industry baselines for all environmental impacts will be established allowing concrete producers to participate further in LEED v4 by demonstrating they perform better than the baseline. A number of baselines will be established at the national and regional levels. The baselines would encompass mix designs with 100% portland cement to high volume replacement of portland cement with supplementary materials representing a variety of applications and exposure conditions. 

The project was started in December 2013 and will be completed in November 2014.

For more information, visit www.nrmca.org/sustainability/EPDprogram or contact Lionel Lemay at LLemay@nrmca.org or 847-918-7101.