SUSTAINABILITY - EPD

We have now developed an EPD for Hi-Con balconies

AN EPD FOR BALCONIES

In one of our previous posts "CRC Application Cases - Sustainability," we commented on how difficult it is to compare the environmental footprint of Ultra High Performance Concrete CRC with other materials - and used this as an excuse for why we have not yet put together an EPD (Environmental Product Declaration) for our products. To be honest, it was not something we rushed to do, as we knew that the high cement content and steel fibers in CRC would likely not give us the best result - and although EPD and LCA (Life Cycle Analysis) have been discussed for years, it has rarely been a requirement for projects.

However, we quickly realized that if we are not part of paving the way for this, it would be difficult to be world leaders in UHPC, and therefore we have now developed an EPD for Hi-Con balconies.

We based our EPD on two representative projects - and chose them to cover our range of balconies as well as possible in terms of how many m2 we get per m3 CRC, how many molds are needed, and how large the brackets had to be for installation, etc.

What is Ultra High Performance Concrete?

GOOD RESULTS

The process of drafting the EPD seemed quite simple - to include everything used in the two projects - but it turned out to take longer than expected. It wasn't difficult - it just required attention to detail, which is not one of my strong suits. Every time we thought we were done with the task, Charlotte from FORCE Technology (who helped us compile the LCA and EPD) had more details that she needed to account for. Fortunately, she was very patient, as we must admit that figuring out exactly which cranes were used for the balcony installations, how many bolts were used for the brackets, how much adhesive was used for the molds, etc., is not something I usually prioritize. In the end, we are confident that Charlotte's diligence paid off, as the reviewer had very few questions before our LCA and EPD were accepted.

The results turned out to be better than we expected! Our "carbon footprint" until the elements are ready to leave the plant - from cradle to gate - is about 1050 kg CO2 per m3 CRC, and if we include transport to the site and installation (A4 and A5 - and the mounting brackets are quite significant) the total "footprint" is about 1320 kg CO2.

It is still a bit difficult to compare our results with other materials. Data for similar types of elements are not easy to find - and when we do find them, it is repeatedly mentioned that the data should not be used for comparison. However, we are somewhat reckless in this regard, so we have tried to compare anyway - and fortunately for us, the comparison is positive with similar elements. Our "carbon footprint" based on m3 is higher than for conventional concrete, but when we look at the effective "carbon footprint" (based on what is used for 1 m2 of balcony) for the different materials, we emit less CO2 than conventional concrete, as we typically use 50% less material than ordinary concrete. Additionally, we have other advantages, such as a much longer lifespan without the need for maintenance (100 years+).

A LOWER CO2 EMISSION

We wanted to comment on how we compare with other types of UHPC, but we have not been able to find information on other EPDs for UHPC - only more general comments on sustainability, like the ones we used to make. If any of you have this type of information, please send us an email.

The next step for us will be to reduce our CO2 emissions as much as possible - but the easy solutions for this (reducing cement content and fiber content) are not really an option in this case. As expected, cement content and steel fiber content have the most significant impact on our footprint for our type of UHPC, but due to performance and documentation requirements, we cannot change the recipe as much as would be necessary. However, going through this process and just having the numbers have made us more aware of how even the smaller things matter. We have already started to change some processes as much as possible in this regard (our plant manager is instrumental in this). One example is minimizing our waste (for example, by using our surplus concrete to cast standard products that can actually be sold and used), and another is using more standard molds where small changes can be made.

In the longer term, we can also change the mixes - for example, from i2 to i3 - for some of our balconies, which significantly reduces the CO2 footprint. I3 was used for the Catharina Bridge - but since our CE marking for balconies is based on i2, this is not something that can be done quickly.

You can find our full EPD here