The Navigation
The monthly briefing for sustainability practitioners
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Guides & reference
Four free guides for manufacturers. Open the summary to see what each one covers, or download the full PDF.
Regulation
EU Digital Product Passport: what manufacturers need to know
Under the EU Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR), most product categories will need a Digital Product Passport by 2030, and batteries and textiles come first. The guide explains which data to start collecting now, how the DPP connects to the EPD and LCA work you already do, and the three decisions every manufacturer has to make before their sector’s deadline.
What’s inside: a short summary
- What a DPP is. A standardised digital record linked to the product through a QR code or RFID tag. It doesn’t replace your EPD, it builds on it and adds product identity, materials, traceability, repairability and end-of-life information. It has to stay accurate for the product’s whole life, and at least ten years after.
- There is no single deadline. Each product group gets its own delegated act, usually followed by 18–24 months for large companies. ESPR has been in force since July 2024, the EU DPP Registry starts in July 2026, and the battery passport is mandatory from 18 February 2027. Iron and steel, textiles and aluminium are next. Construction products also have their own track under the revised CPR (EU 2024/3110).
- Your EPD is a head start. The carbon footprint and much of the inventory data map straight to DPP fields. The real gap is infrastructure: unique product IDs, machine-readable data and a connection to the EU registry.
- Three decisions. Confirm which deadline applies to your products. Check your data readiness, where the usual gaps are supplier data beyond tier 1 and product identifiers (plan for 12–18 months). Then choose your platform and data carrier.
Related service: Digital Product Passport
EU Digital Product Passport: what manufacturers need to know
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LCA
Choosing an LCA tool: a buyer’s guide for construction manufacturers
One Click LCA, SimaPro, Sphera and EC3 are good at different things. The guide lists the criteria that really decide the choice: which EPD programmes the tool works with, whether it can export DPP data, what your team can handle and what it costs over the years. It also shows how to run a selection process your procurement team will sign off.
What’s inside: a short summary
- One Click LCA (merged with SimaPro in 2025) has the largest construction dataset library and fast EPD workflows to EN 15804+A2. It suits manufacturers scaling up their EPD programme. SimaPro stays available for expert modelling.
- Sphera (GaBi) is the enterprise option for heavy industry. It can calculate carbon footprints automatically from ERP or PLM data across thousands of products, but it needs LCA specialists to set up.
- EC3 is free and North America-focused. It is good for comparing materials at design stage, but it isn’t built to produce verified EPDs. OpenLCA is free and transparent, but EPD work with it is mostly manual.
- Five criteria decide the choice: EPD programme compatibility (around 25%), DPP data export (20%), how easy it is for your team (20%), three-year total cost of ownership (20%), and the verifier network and speed to EPD (15%). Run a short pilot with your own product data before you sign.
Related service: LCA strategy & EPD advisory
Choosing an LCA tool: a buyer’s guide for construction manufacturers
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Biodiversity
TNFD in practice: a starting point for industrial companies
The TNFD framework asks companies to look at how they depend on nature and how they affect it, on land, in freshwater, in the ocean and in the atmosphere. For an industrial manufacturer this means mapping where your sites and supply chains touch these systems, and reporting the material risks and opportunities the way investors now expect.
What’s inside: a short summary
- Why it matters. Water scarcity, soil degradation and biodiversity loss already show up as supply disruptions, higher input costs and regulatory risk. They rarely appear in financial models, because society pays the cost. TNFD brings them back into financial decisions.
- The LEAP approach, step by step. Locate: find where your sites and suppliers meet sensitive ecosystems (tools such as ENCORE and IBAT help). Evaluate: map what you depend on and what you impact. Assess: turn this into financial risks and opportunities. Prepare: set targets in line with the Global Biodiversity Framework and report in the four-pillar structure you may know from TCFD.
- Where to start without a nature team. A quick scoping study with free tools (WWF Water Risk Filter, IBAT, ENCORE) gives you a risk heat map. Your LCA data on land use, water and eutrophication already feeds the Evaluate step, and SBTN offers an easy entry point for targets.
- The regulatory pull. CSRD includes a biodiversity standard (ESRS E4) and CSDDD requires supply chain due diligence. Even companies outside their scope will get questions from large customers who are in scope.
Related service: Biodiversity & nature
TNFD in practice: a starting point for industrial companies
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Circularity
Making the business case for circularity in construction materials
Most circular projects stall at the same point: the finance team doesn’t believe the numbers. The guide shows how to build an NPV and payback analysis for take-back schemes, recycled content or product-as-a-service, with revenue, cost and risk assumptions that survive a CFO’s questions.
What’s inside: a short summary
- Three models, three payback profiles. Take-back programmes often pay back in 3–7 years in documented cases, best with high-value materials like aluminium, steel or engineered timber. Recycled content can pay back in 1–3 years where customers pay a premium. Product-as-a-service takes longest and usually needs contracts of five years or more.
- What finance needs to see. NPV, IRR and discounted payback together. If you only show payback, the project looks riskier than it is.
- Honest assumptions. Use your real cost of capital (typically 8–12% for industrial firms), today’s material prices, the full cost of reverse logistics, and a carbon price only if you actually face one. Avoided fines are risk reduction, not revenue.
- Three scenarios. Base, downside and severe. If the project still has a positive NPV in the severe case, the case is robust. If not, show the break-even point for the most sensitive driver, usually the recovered material price or logistics cost.
Related service: Circular economy strategy
Making the business case for circularity in construction materials
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Blog
From the blog
Shorter pieces on what the new EU rules mean in practice, and on the work behind LCAs, EPDs and biodiversity assessments.
Have a specific question?
If you’re stuck on something and can’t find the answer here, write to us directly.