What Is Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) Software?
EPD software, or environmental product declaration software, is a digital tool designed to automate and simplify the creation of EPDs.
An environmental product declaration (EPD) is a standardised, verified document that communicates a product's environmental impacts and facilitates and ensures compliance with various standards and regulations. This includes factors like carbon footprint, energy use, raw material sourcing, water consumption, and end-of-life disposal.
Across industries businesses recognise the strategic advantage of transparent environmental communication. But producing an EPD is a complex undertaking, involving vast datasets, intricate calculations, and adherence to stringent international standards. The EPD process and EPD generation are key steps that environmental product declaration software streamlines, making it easier to comply with regulations and achieve third party verification.
With the right software, your business can lead the way toward a greener future, where impact reduction, not just reporting, drives product innovation.
Core Functions of EPD Software
Modern EPD software platforms support the entire EPD process. Key capabilities are for example:
- Automates LCA Processes
A reliable EPD software tool simplifies complex lifecycle assessments (LCA) by automating data input, modelling and analysis. This makes it easier to evaluate a product's impact from raw material extraction to disposal.
- Generates EPD Reports
The software enables the generation of standardised, verified EPD documents that comply with international EPD standards like EN 15804+A2 and ISO 14025 and the applicable product category rules for your sector. Standard outputs often include key indicators such as Global Warming Potential (GWP), ozone depletion, and eutrophication.
- Manages Data and Databases
Many tools include preloaded databases of materials, processes and impact factors, making data collection more consistent, traceable and efficient.
- Facilitates Verification and Certification
It streamlines the third-party verification process, ensuring that the final EPD meets the required criteria for accuracy and credibility. An efficient EPD process supported by robust software reduces manual errors and helps teams stay aligned throughout data collection, modelling, and verification.
- Supports Regulatory Compliance
The EPD software helps manufacturers align with global and regional regulations such as the Construction Products Regulation (CPR) or the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR).
Organisational Benefits of EPD Software
The adoption of environmental product declaration software offers a multitude of benefits for organisations and industries committed to sustainability and market leadership:
- Accelerate time to market for products that meet environmental and procurement criteria
- Ensure alignment with the formats and verification processes required by EPD program operators
- Improve data accuracy through built-in validation and centralised systems
- Reduce costs associated with consultancy, data errors, and verification delays
- Comply consistently with evolving standards like EN 15804 and ISO 14025
- Scale efficiently across product lines while maintaining consistency across EPD program operator rules
- Enable internal collaboration by connecting R&D, compliance, and sustainability teams
- Support informed design choices through lifecycle insights and impact modelling
- Strengthen credibility and trust through transparent declarations
- Streamline verification by delivering data in formats recognised by EPD program operators
- Provide foundational data for CSRD-aligned reporting, helping companies connect product-level LCA and EPD data to their corporate ESG disclosures.
EPD software supports every stage of EPD development, from sourcing primary data to final third-party verification, ensuring consistency and transparency throughout.
Who Needs EPD Software?
Environmental product declaration software is beneficial for a wide range of industries and organisations, particularly those involved in:
- Construction Materials Manufacturing: Cement, steel, insulation, timber, windows, concrete, and roofing materials.
- Building Products: HVAC systems, lighting, interior finishes, and electrical components.
- Consumer Goods: Textiles, electronics, packaging, and household appliances.
- Automotive Industry: Vehicle components and entire vehicles.
- Chemical Industry: Polymers, paints, and specialty chemicals.
- Consulting Firms: Specialising in LCA and EPD development, offering efficient services to clients.
- Large Enterprises: With diverse product portfolios and a need for consistent environmental reporting.
- SMEs: Looking to enter markets where EPDs are increasingly required without extensive internal LCA expertise.
For companies affected by the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), EPDs offer a structured way to document embedded emissions and support regulatory compliance.
The Challenge of Traditional Manual EPD Creation
Traditionally, creating an EPD involved a labour-intensive, error-prone manual process. This typically included:
- Data Collection: Sourcing vast amounts of data from various departments, suppliers, and databases. This can be fragmented and inconsistent.
- LCA Modelling: Conducting LCAs by performing complex LCA calculations using spreadsheets or generic life cycle assessment tools and LCA software, requiring specialised expertise.
- Data Analysis: Interpreting the results to evaluate environmental impacts and data quality, and identifying key environmental impacts.
- Report Generation: Manually compiling the EPD document, ensuring adherence to strict formatting and content requirements.
- Verification Management: Coordinating with third-party verifiers, which can be a lengthy iterative process.
These manual processes are not only time-consuming and resource-intensive but also susceptible to human error, leading to potential delays, inaccuracies, and increased costs. This is where EPD software emerges as a game-changer, transforming a daunting task into a streamlined, efficient, and accurate process.
Industry Spotlight: EPD Software in the Construction Industry
The construction sector stands at the forefront of the sustainability movement, given its significant resource consumption and environmental impact. EPD software has become an indispensable tool for construction businesses aiming to quantify, report, and improve their environmental performance.
EPD software streamlines the process of creating, verifying, and publishing construction EPDs, ensuring compliance with industry standards and specific requirements. This enables construction businesses to efficiently generate accurate environmental product declarations, identify environmental hotspots, and make data-driven decisions to enhance sustainability performance. Many platforms now support digital EPD formats (machine-readable), making it easier to integrate data with BIM systems and public databases.
Choosing the Right EPD Software: Key Considerations
When selecting an EPD software solution, it’s important to look beyond core functionality and assess how well it aligns with your organisation’s tools, processes, and long-term sustainability goals.
- LCA Database Integration:
- Does the software integrate with reputable and relevant LCA databases (e.g., Ecoinvent, GaBi)?
- Are the datasets up-to-date and geographically appropriate for your operations?
- Product Category Rules (PCR) Compatibility:
- Does the software support the specific PCRs relevant to your industry and products?
- Can it easily adapt to new or updated PCRs?
- Does it offer access to a built-in PCR library or integration with verified PCR repositories for easier rule selection?
- User-Friendliness and Interface:
- Is the software intuitive and easy to navigate, even for users without extensive LCA backgrounds?
- Are there clear dashboards and visualisations?
- Data Import and Integration Capabilities:
- Can it seamlessly integrate with your existing ERP, PLM, or other internal systems?
- What are the options for data import (APIs, spreadsheets, direct connectors)?
- Reporting and Customisation:
- Does it offer pre-built EPD templates for relevant programme operators?
- Can you customise reports for internal analysis or specific stakeholder needs?
- Scalability and Flexibility:
- Can the software accommodate your growing product portfolio and evolving EPD requirements?
- Is it adaptable to changes in regulations or internal processes?
- Support and Training:
- What level of customer support is provided (technical support, training, documentation)?
- Are there community forums or resources available?
- Cost and Licensing Model:
- Understand the pricing structure (subscription, per EPD, enterprise license).
- Consider the total cost of ownership, including implementation and training.
- Verification Support:
- Does the software streamline the verification process and facilitate communication with verifiers?
- Are there features for pre-verification checks?
- Cloud-Based vs. On-Premise:
- Consider the advantages of cloud-based solutions (accessibility, automatic updates, lower IT overhead) versus on-premise deployments (data control, customisation).
- Security and Data Privacy:
- Ensure the software adheres to robust data security protocols and privacy regulations (e.g., GDPR).
Achieving International Recognition with EPDs
For businesses aiming to reach global markets, internationally recognised EPDs are a powerful tool. Declarations that comply with standards like ISO 14025 provide a common framework for assessing environmental performance and are widely accepted across borders.
Platforms such as the International EPD System offer global infrastructure for creating, verifying, and registering EPDs—making it easier to demonstrate environmental credentials in both established and emerging markets.
Verified EPDs strengthen trust with regulators, customers, and partners, and can simplify market entry by meeting diverse environmental requirements. As demand for more sustainable products grows, international recognition helps standardise communication and opens doors to new business opportunities.
The Role of EPD Program Operators and How Software Supports Them
EPDs must be published under a recognised program operator to ensure transparency, credibility and comparability. Operators like EPD International, UL and IBU provide the frameworks and verification procedures that govern how EPDs are created and maintained. Good EPD software, like EandoX, supports output formats and templates for multiple program operators, making it easier to meet diverse regional or sector-specific requirements.
EPD Software vs. EPD Generators
Some EPD software platforms are also referred to as EPD generators. These tools are specifically designed to automate the creation of EPDs from predefined templates and datasets. Some platforms even include a pre-verified EPD generator, enabling rapid and standardised declaration creation with built-in compliance and reduced need for rework. Advanced EPD systems often incorporate AI-driven features to improve data accuracy, suggest optimisations and automate hotspot detection.
While all EPD generators are a form of EPD software, not all EPD software includes robust generation capabilities. If scalability, speed, and version control are priorities, a generator-equipped solution may be essential.
Beyond Compliance: Focusing on Environmental Product Performance
While many platforms focus solely on Environmental Product Declarations, EandoX goes a step further. We go beyond documentation, enabling organisations to measure and improve environmental product performance.
This performance-driven approach reflects a shift in mindset from proving compliance to driving real environmental improvements. Software that supports environmental performance can help teams:
- Identify hotspots across the product lifecycle
- Simulate design changes and their impact
- Set measurable targets for impact reduction
Why Choose EandoX?
With EandoX you can generate EPD:s automatically. Whether you're publishing your first EPD or managing hundreds, EandoX simplifies the entire process—from data to decision. Generate compliant, pre-verified EPDs at scale, collaborate in the cloud, and integrate sustainability into your design workflows. And when you're ready to go beyond reporting, our performance-focused tools help you design for a greener future.
Easy access to public EPDs
Find out how to access publicly available Environmental Product Declarations instantly with EandoX’s new Global Library.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
What are the main differences between EPD software and traditional LCA tools?
Traditional LCA tools are built for broad environmental assessments and are often used in research or custom analysis. They require expert knowledge and significant manual input. EPD software, on the other hand, is specifically designed to produce standardised, verifiable Environmental Product Declarations. It includes features like automated workflows, built-in product category rules (PCRs), pre-formatted EPD template and verification support to ensure regulatory compliance.
Can EPD software automate data collection across my entire supply chain?
Many modern EPD software solutions can integrate with ERP, PLM, and supplier systems to automate the flow of environmental data. While full automation depends on your systems and data quality, leading platforms support APIs, spreadsheets, and third-party integrations to streamline and scale data gathering across product lines and suppliers.
How does EPD software integrate with existing environmental reporting systems?
EPD software can support broader ESG and sustainability reporting by feeding verified product-level data into corporate reporting platforms. This is particularly useful for aligning with frameworks like CSRD or GRI. Some tools also offer export formats compatible with environmental databases and compliance portals, enhancing traceability and reducing duplication of work.
What is the difference between an EPD tool and EPD software?
An EPD tool is usually a basic calculator or template for creating a single EPD, often limited to specific sectors or products. EPD software is a more advanced, scalable platform with built-in databases, LCA modelling, collaboration features, and support for multiple program operators.
Find answers to more common questions about how EandoX helps you generate EPDs and visit our full FAQ page.
