Thanks to the technical input of the members and the support of an external consultant, TBE has developed the Product Category Rules (PCR) for clay bricks, blocks, roof tiles and pavers. These PCR establish a set of specific rules and guidelines for reporting the environmental performance of clay construction products in the form of an Environmental Product Declaration (EPD).
EPDs are a standardised way to communicate the environmental impact of a product on the basis of a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology. EPDs can be used for different purposes. For instance, designers are often requesting EPDs of construction products to be used as input for assessing the environmental performance of buildings.
In 2012, TBE identified the lack of harmonised PCR for the development of EPDs for clay construction products. With a common PCR, EPDs developed at national and/or European level will be based on the same guidelines and similar assumptions. The TBE PCR for clay construction products is based on the European horizontal harmonised standard EN 15804, which was developed in CEN/TC 350 “Sustainability of construction works”.
In addition to the TBE PCR, a guidance document summarising the basic principles of the PCR has been developed. It also provides guidelines about the input and output data that need to be collected before conducting the LCA study.