Health Product Declarations

As the previous discussion points out, there is clearly growing recognition and use of EPDs for addressing the environmental impact of building products and materials. Still missing, though, is the attention needed to ecotoxicity and human toxicity in those products. In response, a group of leading architects, building managers and product manufacturers have banded together to create a whole new standard for product hazard reporting that responds more responsibly to concerns of human health and environmental toxicity. The new standard is called the Health Product Declaration (HPD), and it represents a major step forward in product transparency. HPDs build on and incorporate the data from the EPD but goes on to combine it with trustworthy and verifiable measures of ingredients that impact ecotoxicity and human toxicity.

Green Building programs and certifications such as SMaRT and LEED are relying more on the use of EPDs to identify the true green nature of materials and products used in buildings.

Photos courtesy of Forbo Flooring Systems

As such, it creates a disclosure document that truthfully indicates the toxicity impact of a product on the people who live with it, and the natural environment that it exists within. As envisioned, the HPD will create a single standard that can be used to create an apples-to-apples comparison of products based on their ingredients.

The true beauty of the HPD is its ability to be impartial, while also addressing industry concerns about the fairness of standards. To remain objective, HPDs use an open-source approach to deciding which criteria are included, placing decision making power in the hands of architects, specifiers and others without a vested interest in the outcome, hence no individual can unduly influence it. On the one hand radical environmentalists cannot unduly sway the standard but neither can industry insiders with a status quo to protect. All professionals can have input in shaping the standard to keep it practical and fair. Admittedly, it is difficult to measure the absolute potential for future toxicity without a crystal ball. But if judgments must be made, it is a far better idea to have everyone in the product safety equation at the table sharing all the information available. It is far better for human health and our natural environment as well.