EPD: Environmental Product Declaration
How to state the environmental impact of a product or service
The Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) provides detailed information about the environmental impact of a product or service. EPDs are based on Product Category Rules (PCRs) which provide rules, requirements and guidelines for the environmental life cycle assessment of a defined product category.
The EPD allows to:
- define the complete environmental profile of a product/service;
- identify possible improvement strategies, determining the most critical elements according to different categories of environmental impact;
- enhance the company's attention to environmental issues;
- benefit from a more transparent relationship with clients.
RINA verifies the Environmental Product Declaration (EPD), which may concern:
- the pre-certification of an EPD (when PCR is under development);
- the product/service of a single company (Product EPD);
- the average product of companies in a specific sector/geographical area (Sector EPD);
- the focus on a single category of environmental impact, e.g. climate declarations (Single Issue EPDs);
- EPD Process Certification, where the organization can independently create and publish EPDs without involving a third-party verifier for each EPD produced.
Why choose RINA?
RINA was one of the first accredited verification bodies in this area, initially with SWEDAC in 1998 and since 2004 with ACCREDIA (Accreditation Certificate no. 0002 VV) without geographical limitations, and can therefore provide the service for any type of organization, wherever it is located.
Verification process
The verification process is divided into the following steps:
- opening contract with clients: acceptance of the offer formulated following receipt of the informative questionnaire;
- document review: strategic and risk analysis, evaluation of the EPD study, data gathering and calculation methodologies;
- verification activity: on-site verification, examination of the completeness of sources and flows, verification of data acquisition and modelling of the calculations carried out within the software used for analysis;
- reporting: preparation of the verification report and the draft of the audit opinion/certificate (in the case of EPD Process Certification);
- independent technical review of the verification activities performed;
- approval of the verified EPD on the EPD International website.
