29th May 2018
To date, Dulux Australia have published three EPDs for their paint products through the Australasian EPD Programme. We spoke to Dulux Brand Manager, Stephen Champion who explained that the verifiable, transparent nature of EPDs lends them a high degree of trust and also enables Dulux to make critical sourcing decisions.
We decided to produce EPD’s for a variety of reasons. Firstly to help us understand the impact our processes and products were having on the environment and where we could lessen that impact. Secondly, we saw EPD’s as a verifiable and transparent source of information. The trust people have that these documents are not just corporate greenwashing is important to us as a source of information about the relative impacts of paint products. And thirdly, the EPD documentation helps our customers to achieve their goals for creating greener buildings, and having this documentation allows us to provide extra benefit to our customers and consumers.
The process was very thorough, with data from every aspect of our business required as an input to the end result. This was important to us, as we could easily verify that our end product had impeccable standards for VOC content, but wanted a more holistic view of how we obtained that product and what happened during and after use. It also made us aware of our sourcing of certain raw materials – and how varied in environmental impact our suppliers can be, especially considering they are producing different grades of the same material.
Internally, we have used the EPD to better understand the impact of our sourcing, manufacturing and distribution processes and to evaluate how to make these better where possible. Architects and specifiers have used the document to improve the Greenstar rating of the buildings they are creating. Having EPD’s for the materials used in a building strengthens the Green Star application allowing for a more highly rated building design.
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