Sources: CP staff; CarbonCure Technologies Inc., Halifax, Nova Scotia
In a nod to customers aligning project specs with forthcoming U.S. Green Building Council certification guidelines, Oldcastle Architectural’s business serving Chicago and upper Midwest markets has announced a Health Product Declaration (HPD) for its Trendstone Sandstone ground face concrete masonry unit.
“The construction industry is going through a transformative change,” says Northfield Block President Craig Belasco. “Architects are demanding information about the health impacts of building materials, so they can create healthy and safe buildings. Northfield is thrilled to be leading the industry in being the first to respond to these demands.”
An HPD reconciles a product’s ingredients against Priority Hazard Lists of the Health Product Declaration Collaborative. Northfield Block cites 13 Trendstone Sandstone ingredients in descending order of volume, from fine aggregate (50-60 percent) to tricalcium aluminiate and calcium oxide (both < 1percent). All are marked “No warnings found on HPD Priority list,” except for crystalline silica (1-5 percent). The Northfield Block document was developed in compliance with the Collaborative’s Health Product Declaration open standard, and is available for download here.
The HPD backs up another Trendstone Sandstone value proposition to green-building interests: It embodies waste carbon dioxide through a kiln-bound product injection process Northfield Block adopted earlier this year. The CO2 reacts with the dry mixes to form limestone—effectively sequestering the gas—and accelerates concrete masonry curing, thereby lowering kiln energy requirements. Northfield Block’s HPD release follows another milestone from the charter CarbonCure process user, Ontario-based Atlas Block, which penned the first Environmental Product Declaration for a CMU molded in North America.
The declarations dovetail the new version of the USGBC’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design rating system to be launched at the Greenbuild International Conference and Expo, November 20-22 in Philadelphia. LEED v4 includes a section, Materials and Resources: Building Product Disclosure and Optimization, providing construction projects points where HPD or EPD accompany at least 20 specified products.