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News | 2021-07-02
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Requirements for climate declarations for buildings

Last week, the parliament said yes to the Government's proposal for a climate declaration for buildings. The new law takes effect at this years end and applies to newly produced buildings. IVL has, on behalf of the National Board of Housing, Building and Planning, produced the climate database that will be used to meet the legal requirement. IVL's tool Byggsektorns Miljöberäkningsverktyg, BM (In English: the construction sector's Environmental Calculation Tool) can be used to produce such climate declarations and for other purposes.

– The climate database together with the Construction Sector's Environmental Calculation Tool is a great help for the construction sector to be able to calculate its climate impact and to reduce it. Having common tools and databases is a prerequisite for being able to make comparable calculations and set clear procurement requirements, says Martin Erlandsson at IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute.

The new law means that the client is obliged to submit a climate declaration that contains information on the climate impact from the building. There are legal requirements for climate declarations for buildings in other countries, but the unique thing about the Swedish statutory climate declaration is that the climate impact must be calculated on what has actually been built. Only when the climate declaration has been submitted to the National Board of Housing, Building and Planning may the Building Board issue a final decision, ie announce that the building may be taken into use.

Byggsektorns Miljöberäkningsverktyg, BM, which IVL has developed, can be used to calculate how much climate impact different buildings have and how emissions can be reduced through changed material choices and production methods.

It is already possible to use the National Board of Housing, Building and Planning's climate database in BM to make climate calculations based on so-called “typical” climate data, which is an average value for the construction products used in the Swedish market and used in procurement and various certification systems. For the statutory climate declaration, so-called conservative data must be used. It is possible for the person who draws up the climate declaration to voluntarily exchange the general typical data for supplier-specific data. The National Board of Housing, Building and Planning uses conservative data to stimulate users to voluntarily use supplier-specific data that are based on so-called environmental product declarations (EPD).

– When the National Board of Housing, Building and Planning's guidance with calculation requirements has been published, we will produce an adapted report in BM that the client can use as a basis for the statutory climate declaration based on conservative data. And for the same calculation, they can, without extra work, produce a climate declaration based on "typical data". The idea is that all users with the help of BM should be able to quickly and easily produce calculations that are of high quality, says Martin Erlandsson.

BM is now used by more and more people and can also be used to make climate calculations for renovation and conversion projects.

Read more about BM. Opens in new window.

Read more about the parliaments decision. External link, opens in new window.

For more information, please contact:
Martin Erlandsson, martin.erlandsson@ivl.se, +46 (0)10-788 65 30

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