Glossary

ACC | Autodesk Construction Cloud

BIM | Building Information Modeling

Creation of 2D or 3D models using software that represent built assets, such as buildings. A widely-used means to create building drawings for construction and coordination purposes. Within the AEC industry, the majority of BIM models are created using Autodesk’s Revit software.

Builders

Calculators within EC3 that allow users to estimate the quantity of materials in typical floor and wall assemblies in the absence of detailed quantity information.

CLF | Carbon Leadership Forum

Non-profit organization aiming to transform the building sector to drastically reduce the embodied carbon in building materials and construction via research, resource development, cross-industry collaboration, and member-lead initiatives.

Collection

A group of EPDs returned by a search, with statistics and optionally selected material(s). Typically a collection should represent a list of products functionally suitable for an application.

Embodied Carbon

Carbon impact of a material or product that is associated with their production and construction or installation. At the building scale, a project’s embodied carbon impact is the sum of all the impacts of its components, such as structure, envelope, and interiors.

EPD | Environmental Product Declaration

An independently verified and registered document that communicates transparent and comparable information about life cycle environmental impact of products. It is a summary of product characteristics and LCA results, similar to a nutritional label for the environmental impacts of products.

GWP | Global Warming Potential

An environmental indicator which was developed to allow comparisons of the global warming impacts of different gases. It represents the heat absorbed by any greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, as a multiple of the heat that would be absorbed by the same mass of carbon dioxide. GWP is how a building’s carbon footprint is quantified, with units of kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalent (kgCO2e).

Industry EPD

EPD developed by an industry association on behalf of its member manufacturers. Multiple manufacturers provide data that is combined and averaged in order to determine the industry average impacts of similar products. Distinct from a Product EPD.

LCI | Life Cycle Inventory

Detailed list of inputs and outputs of resources and emissions associated with each process.

LCA | Life Cycle Assessment

Compilation and evaluation of the inputs, outputs and the potential environmental impacts of a product system throughout its life cycle (ISO 14040:2006 and ISO 14044:2006).

LCIA | Life Cycle Impact Assessment

Describes methods for converting inventory data from a life cycle assessment into a set of potential impacts. This enables practitioners and decision makers to better understand the damage caused by resource use and emissions. Example LCIA Methods include TRACI 2.1, CML, and ReCiPe.

Operational Carbon

Carbon impact associated with a building’s day-to-day operations, such as energy usage and water consumption.

Product Category

Group of products that can fulfill equivalent functions (ISO 14025:2006).

Product Category Rules (PCR)

A set of rules, requirements, and guidelines for developing environmental product declarations for one or more product categories.

Product Collection

Group of materials meeting a particular set of search terms, such as performance specifications and location.

Product EPD

An EPD developed by a single manufacturer for a single product type. Reported impacts can be averaged across different variations of the same product type and across manufacturing locations, or they can report impacts for each variation and location individually. EC3 addresses the alignment of EPDs by including EPD uncertainty.

Program Operator

Body or bodies that conduct a Type III environmental declaration program according to ISO 14025:2006. Program Operators maintain a set of rules called General Program Instructions that govern the program’s management including, but not limited to, procedures for EPD verification and publication, PCR creation, data safe-keeping, and approach to recognizing other Program Operators.