Sustainability Series
Week 1: Measuring and reporting carbon 

This week's resources will bring together the latest guidance on the measurement and reporting of the embodied carbon of concrete. Key guidance will be supplied on concrete environmental product declarations (EPDs), benchmarking schemes, Future Homes Hub WLC calculator and updated tools for comparing the embodied carbon of different concrete frame solutions. 

The UK Concrete Industry Sustainable Construction Strategy Framework was published by UK Concrete in March 2024. At the heart of the strategy is collaboration across the value chain to tackle the climate change and biodiversity emergency while creating a safe and healthy built environment.  

This collaboration is the focus of the Sustainability Launch event, Concrete decarbonisation through collaboration, which will take place on 23 September, in London, as well as being available via online webinar. Speakers from across the value chain will be providing an overview and update of current collaborative initiatives and projects aiming to accelerate decarbonisation in the manufacture, specification, design and construction of concrete and projects using concrete.

Spotlight on: EPDs for concrete 

Environmental product declarations, or EPDs, provide transparent data on construction products to help designers choose building materials with lower environmental impacts. An EPD is based on a life cycle assessment (LCA) over the full product value chain using indicators for climate change and other environmental impacts, as well as resource use.  In 2024, MPA published five new sector EPDs for ready-mixed concrete, to help designers understand and quantify the impacts of their mix design choices. 

• More information on EPDs is available in CQ Summer 2024.
• Links to sector EPDs for cement, readymix concrete and precast products are available here.

Spotlight on: benchmarking 

The Low Carbon Concrete Group’s Low Carbon Concrete Routemap was published by the ICE in 2022. This built on the UK Concrete and Cement Roadmap to Beyond Net Zero published in 2020 by the Mineral Products Association (MPA). The first step in the Low Carbon Concrete Routemap is to measure carbon and to create a baseline or benchmark. The LCCG Market Benchmark was created to provide a mechanism for rating the embodied carbon of concrete within the range of concretes in use across the market based on strength. 

• More information and the latest data is available here.

Spotlight on: Concept - new Version 5 now available 

Concept is a free tool from The Concrete Centre enabling users to quickly compare the embodied carbon of a wide range of concrete frame options. Version 5, published in September 2024, includes the addition of a waffle slab option as well as enabling users to select beam widths for selected frame types. Concept also calculates approximate cost and construction time and provides initial element sizes for each frame type.  

• Concept version 5 is available to download here.
• More information on Concept including a step-by-step user guide is available here.

Spotlight on: The UK Concrete and Cement Industry Roadmap to Beyond Net Zero  

• In October 2020 the MPA published its decarbonisation roadmap which identified a number of technology levers for delivering beyond net zero by 2050.    
• Earlier this year a more detailed pathway for achieving  net zero was published. Read it here.