Emidat is building a tool to clean up construction by automating environmental reporting
Fixing the climate crisis is a vast, world-sized puzzle. But one particularly large piece of this ginormous conundrum is construction and real estate —
Fixing the climate crisis is a vast, world-sized puzzle. But one particularly large piece of this ginormous conundrum is construction and real estate — which collectively amount for around 40% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Enter Munich-based data startup Emidat, which has built a software platform for automating the generation of validated Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) certificates for the construction sector.
EPDs are a critical piece of the puzzle for understanding and mitigating the climate impact of the built environment. They require undertaking a product lifecycle assessment (LCA) to declare standardized info about the environmental impact of construction materials and products at each stage of their lifecycle, from production through use to end-of-life.
The problem is that EPDs are typically an arduous and expensive piece of paperwork for manufacturers to produce, says Emidat CEO and co-founder Lisa Oberaigner.
This is where the startup’s data platform comes in, opening up a digital channel for ingesting product data and automating environmental impact declarations via a queryable database that accepts uploads via API, Excel, or BIM (building information modelling); and can itself be accessed via API and UI.
By standardizing the construction sector’s EPD reporting for products, the startup thinks its data layer will fire up the incentive for manufacturers to compete to produce more sustainable buildings materials, helping to shrink the carbon footprint of future builds as a byproduct of platform-enabled transparency.
“The really large manufacturers, the ones that are responsible for these emissions, it’s not like they don’t know how to decarbonize; they know exactly what they need to do, and they invest a lot in these new technologies to produce sustainably,” Oberaigner said. “Now they cannot charge for it, and with what we do, they can put a price tag on it — show that it’s actually more sustainable.
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