ClarkDietrich, the largest manufacturer of cold-formed steel framing products in North America, has published an Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) Optimization Report for its low embodied carbon (LEC) cold-formed steel products, becoming the first steel framing manufacturer to have the data available to help achieve credit for Option 2 under LEED v4.1’s “Material and Resources Credit: EPDs.”

“This is a significant milestone for ClarkDietrich and a game-changer for our customers seeking LEED v4.1 certification,” said Adam Shoemaker, ClarkDietrich’s director of corporate sustainability. “With this EPD Optimization Report, our LEC steel products now contribute to an additional point under LEED v4.1, contributing the same number of points/products as our LEC EPD published in March.”

Under LEED v4.1, building teams can earn up to 2 points for the MR Credit: EPDs. To earn these points, teams must achieve one or more of the following options:

• Option 1: Environmental Product Declaration (1 point)
• Option 2: Embodied Carbon/LCA Optimization (1 point)

Option 1 requires that a project include at least 20 different products from at least five different manufacturers that meet certain disclosure criteria. Because ClarkDietrich’s LEC EPD is a product-specific Type III EPD, its LEC steel products count as 1.5 products toward the required 20 for Option 1. 

Option 2 requires that projects include at least five products from at least three manufacturers that have a compliant embodied carbon optimization report. With its new EPD Optimization Report, ClarkDietrich LEC steel products now count as 1.5 products toward the required five for Option 2. While Option 2 requires fewer products than Option 1, there are only a handful of products on the market that meet the criteria for Option 2. 

“This is a major step forward in our commitment to sustainability,” Shoemaker said. “We’re proud to help our customers succeed and make a real difference in the built environment.”

The EPD Optimization Report is an independent-party–verified comparative analysis on ClarkDietrich’s LEC steel framing systems. The assessment provides a Cradle-to-Gate comparison of the company’s LEC EPD against its standard EPD as a baseline. The report concludes that ClarkDietrich LEC cold-formed steel framing systems offer more than a 10% reduction in global warming potential (in fact, it shows a 30.3% reduction in GWP).

To learn more about ClarkDietrich’s commitment to sustainability, visit clarkdietrich.com/sustainability.