Health Product Declaration Matures with New Feature

It would seem at first glance like a simple proposition: provide a standard format for reporting on the contents of a building product or material. Like anything in real life, however, as you look more closely, you discover that it’s not so simple.

That dynamic explains the development of the Health Product Declaration, which has evolved through numerous updates since its original release in 2012, to cover nuances and complications in the reporting of product contents.

An HPD for components

Manufacturers of complicated products like furniture or windows don’t typically manufacture all the components that go into their product; they purchase parts and assemble them. That makes it hard for them to report on all the contents of their products; they have to first get that information from their suppliers (who may, in turn, have to get additional information from their suppliers, and so on).

The HPD can’t simplify the actual supply chain, but it can make it easier for building product manufacturers to report on their products by providing options for creating separate declarations for product components, and a way to integrate those component declarations into a Health Product Declaration. That capability is the biggest change introduced with HPD v2.2, which was released as a standard in May 2019, and should be available for use as a reporting format starting in the third quarter of 2019, according to the HPD Collaborative. 

Multiple HPDs for one product

HPD version 2.2 also makes it possible for manufacturers to provide more than one HPD for the same product, to allow for changes in formulation over time. The different HPDs will be distinguished by the manufacturing date of the product.

The new format also helps to standardize how variations in a product can be accommodated within a single HPD.

The HPD was released on a similar timeframe as LEED version 4 and got much of its early traction as a reporting format referenced by LEED. With the recent release of LEED version 4.1, which removes some barriers to earning the material-content related points, HPD and other content reporting formats may see increased adoption and use in the industry.

(Disclosure: Nadav Malin was an early champion and founding board member of the Health Product Declaration Collaborative.)

More on HPDs

What’s an HPD? Health Product Declaration FAQs

HPD User Guide Helps with LEED, WELL Product Selection

For more information:

Health Product Declaration Collaborative
www.hpd-collaborative.org