Various impact assessment method on EN15804

Question

Hi,

I have used Ecoinvent 3.8 EN 15804 and just recently updated to 3.10. There are quite jump in the impact assessment method showing many more categories. I think the EPD template (e.g., Environdec) still follows what shown in Ecoinvent 3.8 (EN15804_A2_2020_3) with 30 categories in total.

When I do EPD calculation, I sometimes use other EPD document since they are the supplier of the company I calculate the EPD for. I will do manual calculation adding the results from other EPD document into my calculation.

With the new additional impact categories in Ecoinvent 3.9 & 3.10, do you have any suggestion how to incorporate EPD documents that are mainly still use the EN15804_A2_2020_3? For example, I use EPD doc with the old method that has 'Exported energy (EE)' while the newer method has 'Exported energy  electrical (EEE)' and 'Exported energy thermal (EET)'; so I can't sum the results.

Can I use 'EN15804_A2_2020_3 method in the EN15804 v 3.10 (is it compatible and is it technically possible)? Is it a wise thing to do?

Thank you.

Answer 1

I would not use the old method in the newer versions and some indicators will not be compatible. Every EN15804 add-on from GreenDelta comes also with improvements in the methods and with new implementations of environmental indicators by ecoinvent. The environmental indicators in the new EN15804 add-ons are based on the ecoinvent implementation and are more compatible with the underlying ecoinvent database. Every update is usually an improvement. Also the methodology of the inventory indicators calculations is improved by GreenDelta with newer versions.

I did not fully understand why you don't use the new methods. Exported energy (EE) is simply the sum of Exported energy electrical EEE and Exported energy thermal EET. Also at Environdec, that you mentioned above, these two indicators are usually reported separately as calculated in the newest EN15804 add-on.

And why is it many more categories? In the newest EN15804 add-on there are 13 mandatory environmental indicators, 5 output indicators, 3 waste indicators and 10 resource indicators that are reported with EPDs, and 7 optional environmental indicators. Maybe you mean the optional indicators. If you don't want to report them you can just remove the results. You can also simply copy paste the whole method and take them out of the calculation if you want (PM, IRP, SQP, HTP-c, HTP-nc, ETP-fw, GWP-GHG/IOBC).

Comments

Hi,

Thank you for the reply and complete explanation.  I understand that Exported energy (EE) is simply the sum of Exported energy electrical EEE and Exported energy thermal EET. I was about to give example of certain situation, but it may not be the best example I can come up with. Never mind though, thanks.