The Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning

Research Project: Updating ÖKOBAUDAT

Project briefing

  • Status Completed
  • Project duration March 2020 – June 2021
  • Programme Future Building

The aim of the project was to implement the necessary changes in order to comply with the new European standard EN 15804+A2. On the one hand, this concerned the ILCD+EPD data format, which had also been expanded somewhat independently of the standard, and on the other hand, the ÖKOBAUDAT website itself and the backend for managing the data. In addition, existing workflows and strategies had to be adapted and communicated to the actors (data suppliers and data users) in a meaningful way. In addition, both the validation profiles for ÖKOBAUDAT and the EPD Editor software had to be adapted.

Background

The assessment of the environmental quality of a building is an essential aspect of the BMI's Sustainable Building Assessment System for Federal Buildings (BNB). For the calculation of global environmental impacts (e.g. greenhouse gases, ozone layer depletion, ozone formation, acidification and eutrophication potential) and indicators of resource consumption (primary energy consumption, abiotic resource consumption), life cycle assessment is required at building level. For this purpose, the Federal Ministry of the Interior offers the online building materials database ÖKOBAUDAT and the building life cycle assessment tool eLCA within the framework of the NBB. Since building products are marketed not only in Germany but also internationally, it is important to offer and use standardised life cycle assessment data for life cycle assessment. Against this background, the International Data Network for Sustainable Building (InData) was founded in 2015 on the initiative of the BBSR. InData is a non-profit working group with the main objective of establishing an international network for EPDs and LCA results in the construction sector – online-based and using open source software.

Objective

The aim of the project was to implement the necessary changes in order to comply with the new European standard EN 15804+A2. On the one hand, this concerned the ILCD+EPD data format, which had also been expanded somewhat independently of the standard, and on the other hand, the ÖKOBAUDAT website itself and the backend for managing the data. In addition, existing workflows and strategies had to be adapted and communicated to the actors (data suppliers and data users) in a meaningful way. In addition, both the validation profiles for ÖKOBAUDAT and the EPD Editor software had to be adapted.

Contractors of the research project were Oliver Kusche Research & Consulting, Freiburg and IBOÖsterreichisches Institut für Bauen und Ökologie GmbH, Vienna.

Contact us

  • Sebastian Rienäcker
    Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development
    Division WB 6 "Instrumente des ressourcenschonenden und klimaangepassten Bauens"
    Phone: +49 3018 401-2754
    Email: sebastian.rienaecker@bbr.bund.de

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