The concept of benchmarking has had an increasingly evident development over the years. The need for a comparison between products placed on the market and “representative” products has always been the subject of discussions and opinions, even more so when environmental impacts are declared.
\nFor construction products, the standard EN 15804 – EN 15804:2012+A2:2019, Sustainability of construction works – Environmental product declarations – Core rules for the product category of construction products\u201d represents, to date, the recognized methodology for calculating environmental impacts and provides some basic information on the comparison between products belonging to the same product category, but without going into detail.
\nIn January 2023, the EN 17672 standard was issued – Sustainability of buildings – Environmental product declarations – Horizontal rules for the
\nbusiness-to-consumer communication, which instead provides horizontal rules for B2C (business to consumer) communication also including a benchmarking system.
\nThe aim and objective of the Standard is to provide the consumer with clear and understandable information, to promote possible comparisons on the environmental impacts of construction products.
\nThe approach is based on the Product Environmental Footprint (PEF) adapted to the specificities of EN 15804.
\nIn the writer’s opinion it is still early to evaluate the effectiveness of the provisions of the standard and it is advisable to wait a few more months to fully understand the mechanisms of a possible comparison between products; however, we want to provide here the information necessary to understand its structure.
\nThe document is based on two fundamental principles for B2C communication: the aggregation of results within modules A1-C4 and the Benchmark.
\nA communication without benchmarking is also envisaged.
\nBenchmarking systems use score comparison.
\nThey can follow three different approaches:
\n\u2022 recommended: by a score that is representative of all LCIA indicators, by aggregating modules A1 to C4 with module D; normalization and weighting according to PEF guidelines;
\n\u2022 basic: single score method that uses only the LCIA “core” indicators, aggregation of modules from A1 to C4 with module D, normalization and weighting as required by the PEF;
\n\u2022 alternative: single scoring method using the \u201ccore\u201d LCIA indicators and one or more additional indicators, aggregation of modules from A1 to C4 with module D, normalization and weighting according to the PEF rules.
\nand satisfy some conditions, of which the most representative are mentioned:
\n\u2022 be related to modules from A1 to C4 and module D;
\n\u2022 be consistent with the same functional unit;
\n\u2022 the stages of the life cycle must be the same.
\nIn the absence of the foreseen conditions, B2C communication is not permitted.<\/p>\n
The requirements for communication with benchmark system are:
\n– Definition of the product category (product name and code, functional unit description, technical performance, possible exclusions).
\n– Functional equivalence. It represents the technical and functional characteristics of the building in which the product is used.
\n– Definition of the life cycle stages to be included. The information includes all modules defined in an EPD (A1 to C4 Cradle-to-Grave, in addition to information module D) according to EN 15804:2012+A2:2019.
\n– Evaluation of the representativeness of the scenarios. For example, it may be necessary to evaluate scenarios that compensate for the lack of information in the EPDs.
\n– Calculation of environmental impact per functional unit, using EPD information by default.
\n– Definition of indicators. Depending on the number of indicators inserted, we can have the recommended, basic or alternative benchmarking systems or communication without comparison (only “core” indicators of EN 15804+A2).
\n– Normalization. It is the stage in which the results of the life cycle impact assessment are multiplied by some normalization factors to calculate and compare the extent of their contributions to the environment. The PEF rules must be followed.
\n– Weighing. It is the phase supporting the interpretation and communication of the results of the analysis. In this step, the normalized results are multiplied by a set of weighting factors (in %) that reflect the perceived importance of the life cycle impact categories considered. The PEF Guidelines provide the approach to be used.
\n– Score calculation. The score is obtained by aggregating the previously normalized and weighted values from the previous phases. In practice, two scores are calculated which will include modules from A1 to C4 and module D.
\n– Benchmarking. It can only be developed for product groups if the relevant conditions are met<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A standard with indications for comparing construction products and choosing the most suitable solution<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":100004488,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-100004487","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100004487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100004487"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100004487\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100004489,"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100004487\/revisions\/100004489"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100004488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100004487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100004487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.epditaly.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100004487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}