Badelement is working every day to improve its carbon footprint. The latest LCA analysis conducted in 2023 by Frandsen & Søndergaard Consulting Engineers shows that a 5.54 m2 concrete bathroom pod – like the one we delivered to the Green Hills building in Solrød – would today have had a carbon footprint of 4.74 kg CO2/m2. This is an improvement of over 15% compared to the previous LCA value of 5.6 kg CO2/m2.
The calculation is based on a concrete bathroom pod in a small apartment, where LCA phases A1-A3, B4, B5, C3 and C4 are included.
The total carbon footprint of the bathroom pod is calculated to be 1314 kg CO2 in total for a 50-year period of consideration. This translates to 26.28 kg CO2 eq. per year (or 4.74 kg CO2 eq. per m2 per year if you look at the bathroom pod in isolation).
The improvement is a result of our focused sustainability efforts and has been achieved through optimisation of processes and material consumption, as well as improved documentation from subcontractors.
We expect to be able to further improve the carbon footprint in the near future.
We have also optimised material consumption and documentation for our lightweight bathroom pod, and the result of the LCA analysis shows 3.57 kg CO2/m2.
This means that if it’s possible to make use of the lightweight construction in your project, the CO2 consumption is very low in comparison to the legal requirements that are set and will be set in the future.
However, the work to optimise the LCA value doesn’t stop here, and we continue to work towards even lower values in the future.
We give a good margin up to the legal requirement
From 2023, the building regulations’ requirement for a CO2 limit is set at 12 kg CO2 eq. per m2 per year. The requirement initially only applies to new buildings over 1000 m2. For other types of construction, the LCA analysis simply needs to be performed. The requirements are planned to be tightened in 2025, 2027 and 2029.
Bathroom pods from Badelement have an impact on this calculation. The calculation ensures that the buildings do not exceed the requirement of 12 kg CO2 eq. per m2 per year.
Therefore, we continuously investigate how processes, materials, transport, etc. can be optimised to reduce overall CO2 emissions.
We continuously optimise our bathroom pods
We are working hard to continually optimize our products, so that in the future we can present an even lower CO2 footprint. This is also in anticipation of the legal limit for CO2 footprints being reduced from 2025.
Read more about Badelement’s sustainability vision here
General Environmental Product Declarations
The calculation in the LCA report is based on several generic and industry EPDs. Product-specific EPDs are expected to give a lower result and also allow for specific products to be replaced by equivalents with lower EPDs. We continuously perform analyses of our bathroom pods in order to optimise their EPD.
The LCA reports are prepared in 2023 by Frandsen & Søndergaard Consulting Engineers.
