DHF (Door & Hardware Federation) is continuing to throw its weight behind the importance of EPD for the construction industry, especially for architects, builders, and specifiers, in meeting the growing requirements relating to the sustainable building process.
An EPD (Environmental Product Declaration) is a registered and independently verified document that communicates standardised, comparable information about the life-cycle environmental impact of products. In summary, it measures the environmental ‘footprint’ of a product.
EPD’s demonstrate the results of a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), detailing ‘cradle to grave’ environmental impact of all processes involved with the manufacture of a product. This can include extraction and processing of raw materials, transport, all elements of the manufacturing process, dismantling and waste disposal.
In June 2017, DHF was considered ‘ahead of the game’ in launching 14 generic EPD’s (locks, door and window handles, hinges (single axis), lock cylinders, sliding door gear, window fittings, door closers, panic exit devices, shutter hardware, letter boxes, padlocks, glass door gear, electromechanical hardware, and push button locks), and since then, has been educating and informing its members about the role and growing importance of EPD in the sustainability process; a complicated subject, DHF has been plugging the ‘information gap’.
All 14 EPD’s are up for renewal this year and are to be renewed every five years (in February of this year, ARGE (the European Federation of Associations of Locks & Builders Hardware Manufacturers) announced that the expiry dates for the EPD had been extended to between September and December 2022, depending on the EPD).
DHF is able to offer the opportunity for its building hardware members to have an EPD on their products through ARGE after signing a licence agreement with them on 10th April 2014. ARGE serves its members, the National Associations, by providing ARGE EPD which they can sublicense and individualise for their members. DHF is represented in Europe and continues to be actively involved with ARGE whose EPD have been written to comply with the format required by EN 15804.
“DHF continues to support the green agenda and the increasing move towards green certification,” explains DHF’s Head of Commercial Operations, Patricia Sowsbery-Stevens. “EPD’s are now viewed as vital in demonstrating sustainability and providing reliable information so one product can be compared with another by looking at the various lifecycle stages. Participation in the EPD programme is crucial if the construction industry is to meet the growing demand for greater sustainability and DHF is pleased to have been one of the trailblazers in this initiative and in promoting a more transparent and sustainable global industry.”
