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WAP Sustainability expands LCA & EPD capabilities with purchase of Trisight Engineering

triSight

NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE, USA, September 26, 2022 /EINPresswire.com/ — — WAP Sustainability, a global life cycle assessment services provider, has announced that it has acquired Trisight Engineering, a leader in life cycle assessments for the asphalt and construction products industries.

• WAP Sustainability has acquired Trisight Engineering to further its LCA and EPD capabilities
• WAP currently helps global companies to understand their climate impacts including carbon footprints while also delivering compliance focused environmental product declarations (EPDs)
• With Trisight’s deep industry experience, WAP is poised to lead companies in complying with new Federal Buy Clean Initiative EPD Requirements, specifically steel, concrete, asphalt and glass producers.

WAP Sustainability, founded in 2008, is a global consultancy with a history of providing technical sustainability and ESG services for brands, manufacturers, and producers. WAP Sustainability is a leading life cycle assessment (LCA) services firm, with a large market share in development of Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs). Recognized in 2022 as #2067 on the Inc. 5000 list, WAP Sustainability’s acquisition of Trisight creates a growth opportunity for tech enabled LCA and EPD services.

“We see this partnership with Trisight as an exciting opportunity to accelerate how we help our clients understand the carbon impacts of their products,” said William Paddock, WAP Co-Founder and Managing Director. “Many of the companies we work with are in need of deep LCA and EPD services to meet market demands for EPDs and WAP will be there to help. I am proud to welcome Trisight and its experienced, accomplished, and passionate team to WAP.”

“Joining WAP gives our team a platform to leverage WAP’s extensive industry knowledge and client base to create the premier LCA provider in North America,” said Lianna Miller, Trisight Co-Founder and Partner. “The opportunity to help more clients understand product level emissions allows us to increase our impact in the world. Joining teams with WAP will allow us to fast-track adoption of our tech-enabled LCA and EPD processes as well as digital EPD development”.

WAP recently announced the launch of the “Sector Supplement for Measuring and Accounting for Embodied Emissions in the Built Environment” with the World Resource Institute (WRI). This method empowers organization to measure and account for the embodied emissions associated with the wood, concrete, steel, glass, and flooring used in building buildings. Last week’s announcement from The White House on a Federal Buy Clean Initiative expands on the WRI Sector Supplement by requiring and incentivizing purchases of products with Environmental Product Declarations, which are a core feature of the WRI Sector Supplement.

“Together, WAP and Trisight will make it easier, quicker and faster for manufacturers and producers to conduct LCAs and create EPDs in order to comply with the new Federal Buy Clean Initiative. This collaboration further demonstrates WAP’s commitment to being the market leader in LCA and EPDs”, said Brad McAllister, Co-Founder and Operations Director of WAP Sustainability.

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WRI approves WAP/BW’s Sector Supplement for Measuring Embodied Carbon in the Built Environment

Built On GHG Protocol

Launched at World Building Day at COP26, the new methodology seeks to advance measuring and reporting of Embodied Carbon

Today, WRI announced the preliminary approval of the “Sector Supplement for Measuring and Accounting for Embodied Emissions in the Built Environment” as the document is in process to receive Built on GHG Protocol Mark. Once finalized, the Supplement will be available on WRI’s website at https://ghgprotocol.org/Guidance-Built-on-GHG-Protocol“

Embodied carbon emissions come from materials used to construct a building. The wood, concrete, steel, glass, and flooring used in making buildings has a carbon impact that is described as the “embodied carbon” of a building or building material. Managing the way buildings are built with embodied carbon in mind is a highly effective strategy for decarbonizing the built environment.

Traditional decarbonization strategies in the built environment focused only on energy efficiency and the reduction of “operational carbon”. While still important, the success of the building industry in reducing energy use (i.e. operational carbon) has led to the spotlight being turned to embodied carbon as the largest contributor of emissions in the built environment (51% of a buildings total emissions are now believed to be “embodied”).

Brightworks Sustainability and WAP Sustainability began working with a coalition of embodied carbon leaders in late 2019 called the Total Carbon Coalition. The challenge was connecting embodied carbon opportunities with corporate carbon accounting practices. Most organizations with significant real estate holdings were not measuring and accounting for the “purchased goods” associated with their buildings.

“We noticed that embodied carbon impacts were missing in most corporate GHG accounting and quickly realized that significant percentages of emissions were not being accounted for. Digging deeper we realized the challenge was how to account for those emissions.” said William Paddock, Co-Founder and Managing Director of WAP Sustainability

The accounting insight led to discussions with clients on how to use the WRI’s GHG Protocols to account for embodied carbon emissions and realized there was some ambiguity in how to do so. The Brightworks and WAP teams approached their own clients and WRI to determine the best path forward, which was to write the Sector Supplement for Measuring and Accounting for Embodied Emissions in the Built Environment using WRI’s Built on GHG Process. The outcome is a comprehensive approach that aligns with the principles of the GHG Protocol to account for embodied carbon in as Scope 3 emissions.

Cynthia Cummis, Director of Private Sector Climate Mitigation, WRI worked with the WAP and Brightworks team on the revisions of the method stating, “The Built on GHG Protocol mark provides validation that  WAP’s guidance is in conformance with GHG Protocol standards and we are excited about the opportunities this resource provides to  scale up GHG accounting and management across the built environment value chain.  Embodied emissions in buildings present a significant opportunity for emissions reductions and we hope this guidance provides the clarity needed for the sector to take more ambitious action.”

“Empowering consistent Embodied Carbon Accounting is just the beginning. We need to align this approach with embodied carbon approaches in green building standards like LEED, drive embodied carbon awareness within the investment community through additional work with SASB and PRI. And finally, we hope to play a role in the development of a sector decarbonization approach within SBTi”, Jeff Frost, Project Manager for Brightworks Sustainability.

Wes Sullens, Director of LEED at the U.S. Green Building Council added that “The USGBC is all-in on embodied carbon and we applaud the work of these leaders in developing a more standardized way of accounting for the full carbon impacts of green buildings. We see this Methodology as a critical stepping-stone for more meaningful embodied carbon accountability and commitments, especially as a complement to aggressive energy conservation and renewable energy strategies found in LEED”.

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Green Building Matters Podcast with Willian Paddock

How much do you know about sustainability in regards to green buildings?  Maybe you have no idea what that is or you have some scanty information. On this episode, we are honored to have William Paddock on the show.

William is the director at WAP Sustainability. Before starting WAP Sustainability, William served as the Sustainability Manager for Mars, Inc. This experience exposed him to the broad nature of sustainability and the challenges of managing sustainability at an enterprise level. As a sustainability manager, he learned first-hand how to prioritize sustainability issues, manage competing stakeholders, and to generate budgets for sustainability projects.

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Climate Activists Maneuver To Reduce Embodied Carbon in Buildings

“EC3 is going to be a big help for companies,” says William Paddock, managing director of WAP Sustainability Consulting, which produces LCAs and EPDs.

“It’s transformative,” agrees Ari Frankel, Alexandria Real Estate Equities’ assistant vice president for sustainability and high-performance buildings. Previously, the tools available were painful to use, he adds. Alexandria is one of six owner/developers piloting EC3.

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Hitting Your Sustainability Goals in 2020?

With social pressure mounting and the evidence of dire need for improvement irrefutable, it’s no wonder that so many companies and brands are targeting 2020 — right around the corner — as a year for major environmental change.

As WAP Sustainability Consulting co-founder William Paddock wrote on the Sustainable Brands blog, “For the sustainability community, 2020 is a particularly important date: 2020 Sustainability Goals have become highly fashionable.”

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WAP: Helping Companies Navigate Hot Spots in Quest for Supply Chain Transparency

WAP Sustainability Consulting works with manufacturers and brands to help them meet customers’ expectations on sustainability – specifically around life cycle assessment (LCA), carbon management and product ingredient transparency, particularly in regards to chemicals management.

We spoke with founder William Paddock to learn more about these current hot spots in the ongoing quest for supply chain transparency.

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Here’s what happens when companies actually track their CO2 emissions

Under current regulations, most companies don’t have to reduce their emissions, or even disclose them. But many are voluntarily scrutinizing their climate footprint anyway, often at the request of investors or corporate customers, says William Paddock of WAP Sustainability, a consulting firm that helps companies with the task.

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