Product Carbon Footprint · ISO 14067
ISO 14067 Cradle-to-Grave Product Carbon Footprint Calculator
Full life-cycle product carbon footprint (PCF) per ISO 14067 — raw materials, manufacturing, distribution, use, and end-of-life in one declared-unit total. Module D recovery credit and biogenic carbon reported as separate memos, never netted into the headline. AR6 GWP-100 for corporate-reporting line items; DEFRA-sourced grid and fuel factors carry their AR5 basis by design.
Boundary (ISO 14067:2018 §6.4): This calculator computes a cradle-to-grave product carbon footprint — the sum of greenhouse-gas emissions across the full life cycle of a product, expressed per declared or functional unit. Life-cycle stages follow the EN 15804 / EN 15978 modular structure: A1–A3 (raw material supply, transport to factory, manufacturing), A4 (distribution), B (use stage), and C (end-of-life). A Module D recovery credit and a biogenic-carbon memo are reported alongside the headline, not inside it.
Declared unit and yield (ISO 14067 §6.4.2): Every PCF is reported per declared unit — per piece, per kg, per m², per m³, or per functional unit. Bill-of-materials rows take a net (in-product) quantity and a yield percentage; net quantity divided by yield gives the purchased mass, so A1 and A2 include production scrap, while A4 and C run on the net in-product mass.
Use stage (B): The use stage is archetype-gated. A passive product carries no use-stage energy; an energy-using product carries B6 operational electricity; fuel-consuming, refrigerant, and consumable archetypes add in-use fuel and refrigerant leakage as applicable. Use-stage emissions are computed across the Reference Service Life and are the dominant term for most energy-using B2C goods.
End-of-life (C) and recovery (D): End-of-life is summed across whichever EN 15804 C-modules each material’s EPD declares (C1 deconstruction, C2 transport, C3 waste processing, C4 disposal) — coverage is ragged and never zero-filled. Module D (reuse, recovery, recycling benefit beyond the system boundary) is reported as a separate line and never netted against the cradle-to-grave total.
GWP basis: Corporate-reporting line items use AR6 GWP-100. DEFRA-sourced grid electricity and fuel factors carry the AR5 GWP-100 basis that is part of their published definition; this asymmetry is by design and the two bases are not mixed within a single line total. Some ÖKOBAUDAT EPD modules (including the Module D credit) are published on an AR5-100 basis at source.
Excluded: Carbon offsets and carbon-neutrality claims are excluded from the PCF inventory (ISO 14067 §6) and handled under a separate standard — ISO 14068-1. Capital-goods amortisation, corporate overheads, and employee commuting are organisational-inventory items, not product-level emissions.
Recycle / incinerate / landfill split (need not sum to 100% — it is normalised). Fossil end-of-life uses each input’s declared EN 15804 C-modules; this route mix governs the biogenic carbon fate and the fallback where a material’s C-modules are ragged.
A2 inbound = purchased mass × scenario distance × freight EF; A4 distribution = shipped (net) mass × outbound scenario × freight EF. Defaults are RICS Table 17 distances and DEFRA freight factors — refine to your supply chain.
Add materials, set the service life and use-stage, then calculate
Results appear instantly. The A1-A3 / A4 / B / C module ladder, a life-cycle waterfall, input hotspots, a primary-vs-secondary data-quality meter, a separate Module D + biogenic-carbon memo, and the full audit trail appear after calculation.
Results are indicative cradle-to-grave Product Carbon Footprints (ISO 14067:2018 / EN 15804+A2 modules A1–C), reported per the declared unit you choose and aligned with the GHG Protocol Product Life Cycle Standard, on an AR5-100 GWP basis (freight and refrigerant factors are AR6-100). A1–A3 use each input’s cradle-to-supplier-gate EPD from ÖKOBAUDAT 2024 / DEFRA generic datasets (or your own supplier factor) plus your site conversion energy; A4 distribution and the B6 grid trajectory are parametric scenario models (distance / rate × editable factor), not measured records; the B use-stage multiplies in-use energy by the Reference Service Life you enter; C end-of-life sums each EPD’s declared EN 15804 C-modules (ragged — missing modules are omitted, never zero-filled), with the route mix governing the biogenic-carbon fate. Module D (reuse / recovery credit) and biogenic carbon (uptake at A1 + release at end-of-life) are shown as separate memos and are never added into the fossil headline. Generic EPDs and parametric assumptions suit early-stage estimating only — replace the most material inputs and the use-phase figures with product-specific (primary) data, refine the transport and end-of-life scenarios, and complete a critical review under ISO 14067 / ISO 14071 before publishing a PCF, issuing an EPD, or exchanging product footprints under PACT / Catena-X.
For most physical products, the emissions that matter are not the ones in the factory. A cradle-to-gate footprint stops at the factory door and can miss the largest stage entirely — the years the product spends drawing power, burning fuel, or leaking refrigerant in the field.
Cradle-to-grave is the only boundary that tells you whether the carbon is in the steel or in the socket.
A cradle-to-grave product carbon footprint (ISO 14067) sums greenhouse-gas emissions across a product’s full life cycle — raw materials, manufacturing, distribution, use, and end-of-life — expressed per declared unit. Offsets are excluded; recovery credits and biogenic carbon are reported separately.
Standard
ISO 14067:2018 — Carbon footprint of products, quantification and reporting. Built on the ISO 14040/14044 LCA framework.
Boundary
Cradle-to-grave: A1–A3 materials & manufacturing · A4 distribution · B use stage · C end-of-life · D recovery (separate).
Declared unit
Per piece · per kg · per m² · per m³ · per functional unit. All results normalise to the unit you declare.
GWP basis
AR6 GWP-100 for corporate-reporting items. DEFRA grid & fuel factors carry AR5 by design.
Life-cycle stages
EN 15804 / EN 15978 modular structure (A1–A3, A4, B, C, D), summed across whichever modules each EPD declares.
Factor sources
ÖKOBAUDAT 2024 EPDs · DEFRA grid & fuel · IPCC 2006 end-of-life · IPCC AR6 refrigerants.
A product carbon footprint is a gross inventory number. Carbon offsets and “carbon-neutral product” claims are excluded from the PCF itself and assessed under a separate standard. Calculate the cradle-to-grave footprint here, then take the result to the carbon-neutrality assessment — never subtract offsets, recovery credits, or biogenic uptake from the headline to reach a lower figure.
ISO 14068-1 Carbon Neutrality → Read the cradle-to-grave methodology
What Is a Cradle-to-Grave Product Carbon Footprint?
A product carbon footprint (PCF) is the sum of greenhouse-gas emissions and removals associated with a product across its life cycle, expressed in CO₂-equivalent per declared or functional unit. The governing standard is ISO 14067:2018, which specifies the principles, requirements, and guidelines for quantifying and reporting a PCF, built directly on the ISO 14040 and 14044 life-cycle assessment framework.
Cradle-to-grave is the boundary that includes every life-cycle stage from raw material extraction through to final disposal. It is distinct from cradle-to-gate, which stops at the factory gate and excludes distribution, use, and end-of-life. For products that consume energy, fuel, or refrigerant in service — appliances, vehicles, equipment, electronics — the use stage frequently dominates the total, and a gate-only footprint understates the true climate impact by a wide margin.
A PCF Is a Gross Number
The headline PCF is a gross GWP-total. It is not reduced by carbon offsets, by recovery credits from recycling, or by biogenic carbon uptake. ISO 14067 explicitly excludes offsetting from the inventory; a “carbon-neutral product” claim is a separate assertion governed by ISO 14068-1 (quantified with the ISO 14068 calculator or the PAS 2060 calculator) and PAS 2060’s successor framework, made after the footprint is quantified, not by netting the footprint down. Two memos sit beside the headline without entering it: the Module D recovery benefit and the biogenic-carbon balance.
The Life-Cycle Stages — A1 Through D, and What Each Covers
ISO 14067 inherits the modular life-cycle structure formalised in EN 15978 and the product-level EN 15804. Each module is a defined slice of the life cycle, which lets a footprint be reported transparently stage by stage rather than as a single opaque number. The calculator computes each module from the inputs you provide and sums them into the cradle-to-grave total.
| Module | Life-cycle stage | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| A1–A3 | Product stage | Raw material supply (A1), transport to the factory (A2), and manufacturing (A3) — including production scrap via the yield factor. This is the cradle-to-gate footprint. |
| A4 | Distribution | Transport of the finished product from factory to point of use. Computed from road and sea freight factors against scenario distances. |
| B | Use stage | Operational energy (B6), in-use fuel, refrigerant leakage, and maintenance or replacement over the Reference Service Life. Archetype-gated — only the relevant sub-modules render. |
| C1–C4 | End-of-life | Deconstruction (C1), transport to processing (C2), waste processing (C3), and disposal (C4). Summed across whichever modules each material’s EPD declares — never zero-filled where absent. |
| D | Recovery (separate) | Reuse, recovery, and recycling benefit beyond the system boundary. Reported as a separate line — never netted into the headline. |
Why End-of-Life Coverage Is Ragged
Environmental product declarations (EPDs) do not all declare the same end-of-life modules. C3 (waste processing) is effectively universal in the catalogue, but C1, C2, and C4 are present only where the underlying EPD reports them. Concrete and plastics, for example, carry no C4 in ÖKOBAUDAT 2024; their end-of-life is modelled through C3 and Module D instead. The calculator sums whatever C-modules exist for each material and tags the per-line coverage, rather than inventing a value for a module the EPD does not declare. This is correct LCA practice — a missing module is a data gap to disclose, not a zero to assume.
Cradle-to-Grave vs Cradle-to-Gate — Where the Boundary Sits
The single most consequential decision in a PCF is where the boundary stops. The two dominant boundaries answer different questions, and choosing the wrong one produces a number that is internally correct but misleading for the decision at hand.
Cradle-to-Gate (A1–A3)
Stops at the factory gate. Covers raw materials, inbound transport, and manufacturing. Appropriate for a component or intermediate material sold business-to-business, where the buyer adds the downstream stages. This is what an EPD’s A1–A3 figure reports and what the cradle-to-gate PCF calculator produces.
Cradle-to-Grave (A1–C)
Extends through distribution, use, and end-of-life. Required for a finished consumer good, where the use stage is often the largest single contributor. This is the boundary an ISO 14067 product-level claim and most B2C disclosures need — and what this calculator produces.
The rule of thumb: use cradle-to-gate when your product is someone else’s input, and cradle-to-grave when your product is used and disposed of in the form you sell it. A steel coil sold to a fabricator is a gate story; a refrigerator sold to a household is a grave story. The same physical material can sit in either boundary depending on who is reporting and what they are selling.
If you have already run a cradle-to-gate footprint, you do not start over for cradle-to-grave — the gate result is your A1–A3 term. Add A4, B, and C on top. The cradle-to-gate calculator and this one share the same material catalogue and declared-unit logic, so a gate footprint extends cleanly to a full life-cycle footprint.
The Functional Unit — Why Every PCF Needs One
A PCF is meaningless without a declared unit. “This product emits 258 kg CO₂e” answers nothing unless you know whether that is per item, per kilogram, or per square metre — and over what service life. ISO 14067 §6.4.2 requires a clearly stated declared unit, and where products deliver a comparable function rather than a comparable physical quantity, a functional unit that captures the service delivered.
The distinction matters most in comparisons. Two insulation products compared per kilogram may rank one way; compared per square metre at equal thermal performance — the functional unit — they may rank the other way, because the lighter product needs more material to do the same job. A declared unit describes the product; a functional unit describes the job. This calculator supports per-piece, per-kg, per-m², per-m³, and per-functional-unit declarations, and offers per-unit, batch-total, and per-unit-year result views so a service-life-normalised figure is available where the use stage matters.
ISO 14067 vs GHG Protocol Product vs PEF — Which Framework Applies
Three product-level carbon-accounting frameworks are in active use, and they are close but not interchangeable. ISO 14067 is the international standard; the GHG Protocol Product Standard is the WRI/WBCSD framework widely used in corporate reporting; the EU Product Environmental Footprint (PEF) is the European Commission’s method, multi-impact rather than carbon-only. They share the ISO 14040/14044 backbone but differ on biogenic carbon treatment, required impact categories, and how product category rules are set.
| Dimension | ISO 14067:2018 | GHG Protocol Product | EU PEF |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scope | Carbon footprint only | Carbon footprint only | Multi-impact (carbon is one of ~16 categories) |
| Basis | ISO 14040/14044 LCA | ISO 14040/14044 LCA | ISO 14040/14044 LCA + PEF Category Rules |
| Boundary | Cradle-to-grave or cradle-to-gate, stated | Cradle-to-grave or cradle-to-gate, stated | Cradle-to-grave by default |
| Biogenic carbon | Reported separately; characterisation specified | Separate reporting required | Prescribed in PEFCR per category |
| Category rules | Product category rules (PCR), where they exist | Product-specific guidance / sector rules | PEF Category Rules (PEFCR), mandatory where published |
| Primary use | International product claims, EPD alignment | Corporate and supply-chain reporting | EU market, Green Claims context |
When Each Applies
Choose ISO 14067 for an internationally recognised, carbon-only product claim, especially where you are aligning with an EPD under ISO 14025 Type III declarations or EN 15804. Choose the GHG Protocol Product Standard where the PCF feeds a corporate inventory or supply-chain programme already built on GHG Protocol scopes. Choose PEF where you are making an environmental claim into the EU market and a Category Rule exists for your product. This calculator quantifies on the ISO 14067 cradle-to-grave basis; the resulting number is directly usable for GHG Protocol Product reporting and as the carbon line of a PEF study, since all three share the LCA backbone.
One data-exchange note: the WBCSD Pathfinder Framework (PACT) defines how PCFs are exchanged between companies along a value chain. This calculator’s audit-trail export is PACT-aligned, so a footprint computed here can be passed to a customer’s Scope 3 system in the expected structure.
Allocation, Biogenic Carbon, and the Hard Methodology Choices
The arithmetic of a PCF is straightforward; the methodology choices behind the numbers are where studies diverge and where verifiers focus. Three choices carry the most weight: allocation, biogenic carbon, and land-use change.
The Allocation Hierarchy
When a process produces more than one output — a refinery yielding several fuels, a dairy yielding milk and meat — its emissions must be divided among them. ISO 14044 sets a strict hierarchy: first avoid allocation by subdividing the process or expanding the system boundary; only where that is impossible, allocate on an underlying physical relationship (mass, energy content); and as a last resort, allocate on economic value. The order is not optional. Reaching for economic allocation first, because revenue data is easy to find, is a common and material error — it can shift large shares of emissions between co-products depending on volatile prices.
Biogenic Carbon and the Separate-Memo Convention
Biogenic carbon — carbon taken up by a plant during growth and released at end-of-life — is tracked as a separate memo, not folded into the fossil headline. Uptake is computed at 3.667 kg CO₂ per kg of biogenic carbon (the stoichiometric CO₂-to-carbon mass ratio), and end-of-life release is accounted where the disposal route oxidises that carbon. For a product with no bio-based inputs the memo is simply empty. For timber, paper, or board, the route mix moves the biogenic balance — but it does not move the fossil end-of-life figure, which comes from each EPD’s declared C-modules.
This separation is why you cannot lower a fossil end-of-life number by raising the recycling percentage in a product made of steel and plastic: the fossil C-module values are fixed by the EPDs, and the route mix only redistributes biogenic carbon, of which there is none. The intuition that “more recycling means less end-of-life carbon” holds for the biogenic memo of bio-based products and for the Module D recovery credit — not for the fossil C figure of a non-bio product.
Land-Use Change
Where raw materials carry land-use-change emissions — agricultural or forestry feedstocks — ISO 14067 and the underlying LCA guidance amortise the one-time conversion over a defined horizon rather than charging it all to a single year’s output. The convention mirrors the GHG Protocol Land Sector treatment. For most manufactured goods this term is zero; it becomes material for food, textile, and bio-based products.
Worked Example — An Energy-Using Appliance, Five Stages Side-by-Side
This example runs the calculator’s default scenario: an energy-using appliance with a steel-and-plastic bill of materials, a twelve-year service life, and a UK grid use phase. Every factor below is a live MasterBrain value, quoted as the engine reads it. The figures reconcile to the calculator’s per-declared-unit result.
Scenario. An energy-using appliance, declared unit 1 piece, assessed across a 2,000-unit batch. Bill of materials: cold-rolled steel sheet (92% yield) and 3,000 kg polypropylene (94% yield) — approximately 6 kg of material per unit. Manufacturing (A3): 1,500 kWh of UK grid electricity for the batch. Transport: national inbound (A2), regional outbound (A4). Use (B6): 150 kWh per unit per year on the UK grid, static grid assumption, over a 12-year Reference Service Life. End-of-life (C): recycle 50% / incinerate 30% / landfill 20%.
| Factor | Value | Basis / source |
|---|---|---|
| Steel A1–A3 | 2.744 kg CO₂e/kg | ÖKOBAUDAT 2024, AR5-100 |
| Steel C1 / C2 / C3 / D | 0.000302 / 0.004260 / 0 / −1.487 kg CO₂e/kg | ÖKOBAUDAT 2024 (no C4); D reported separately, AR5-100 |
| Polypropylene A1–A3 | 2.578 kg CO₂e/kg | ÖKOBAUDAT 2024 (2,577.57 kg/tonne, normalised) |
| Polypropylene C3 | 3.140 kg CO₂e/kg | IPCC 2006 Vol 5 incineration (no C1/C2/C4/D) |
| UK grid electricity | 0.13096 kg CO₂e/kWh | grid.gbr.electricity.location_based |
| Road freight | 0.107 kg CO₂e/t·km | RICS Table 17 distances (120 km in / 80 km out) |
Result, Per Declared Unit
| Stage | kg CO₂e / unit | Share |
|---|---|---|
| A1–A3 materials & manufacturing | 17.7 | 6.9% |
| A4 distribution | 0.05 | <0.1% |
| B use stage (B6 over 12 yr) | 235.7 | 91.3% |
| C end-of-life | 4.7 | 1.8% |
| Cradle-to-grave total | 258.2 | 100% |
| Module D recovery credit (separate) | −6.7 | — |
| Biogenic carbon (no bio-based inputs) | none | — |
Across the 2,000-unit batch this is approximately 516.5 t CO₂e (gate 35.4 t, distribution 0.10 t, use 471.5 t, end-of-life 9.5 t), or 21.5 kg CO₂e per unit-year annualised over the service life.
Reading the Result
The headline is that the use phase — 235.7 kg CO₂e, 91.3% of the total — is roughly thirteen times the manufacturing footprint of 17.7 kg. This is the textbook case for cradle-to-grave under ISO 14067 for a B2C energy-using product: a cradle-to-gate footprint would report only the 17.7 kg A1–A3 figure and understate the product’s real climate impact by an order of magnitude. The Module D credit of −6.7 kg is a genuine recovery benefit, but it sits beside the 258.2 kg headline and does not reduce it. There is no biogenic memo here because nothing in the bill of materials is bio-based.
The cradle-to-grave figure for this product is 258.2 kg CO₂e per unit. It is not 251.5 kg (258.2 − 6.7), and it is not reduced by any offset purchase. The Module D credit and any future offset are reported and assessed separately. Subtracting either to publish a lower headline is the most common integrity failure in product carbon reporting.
Data Quality, EPDs, and Verification
A PCF is only as credible as the data behind each module, and ISO 14067 expects the data quality to be assessed and disclosed, not assumed. The calculator surfaces a primary-versus-secondary data-quality meter so the weakest links in a footprint are visible.
Primary vs Secondary Data
Primary data is measured from the actual process — your own metered electricity, your own supplier’s verified factor. Secondary data is a generic or database value, such as a catalogue EPD or an industry-average factor. Primary data is preferred for the processes you control and for the stages that dominate the footprint; for an energy-using product, that means the use-stage energy assumption deserves the most scrutiny, because a small error there outweighs precision anywhere upstream.
EPDs and Type III Declarations
The material factors in this calculator are drawn from ÖKOBAUDAT 2024, a database of environmental product declarations. An EPD is a ISO 14025 Type III environmental declaration — a third-party-verified, product-category-rule-governed report of a product’s life-cycle impacts. Using EPD-derived factors aligns the footprint with the same data layer that construction and manufacturing supply chains already rely on, and the EN 15804 module structure is what makes stage-by-stage reporting possible.
Third-Party Verification
A PCF intended for a public claim is typically subject to a critical review under ISO 14067, and where it feeds a corporate inventory, verification under ISO 14064-3 applies. The calculator’s audit-trail export — the per-input breakdown, the calculation hash, the MasterBrain version, and the cite-this-factor provenance for each row — is built to support that review, so a verifier can reconstruct every module from declared inputs and named factors.
Common PCF Reporting Errors
The following are the recurring sources of qualified reviews and restated footprints in product-level carbon accounting. The calculator guards against several automatically; spreadsheet-based studies need a manual check on each.
- Reporting a cradle-to-gate figure as if it were cradle-to-grave. For an energy-using product the gate figure can be a tenth of the full footprint. State the boundary explicitly and match it to the claim being made.
- Netting Module D, offsets, or biogenic uptake into the headline. The PCF is gross. Recovery credits and offsets are reported separately and assessed under ISO 14068-1, never subtracted from the inventory total.
- Zero-filling missing end-of-life modules. Where an EPD does not declare C4, the answer is to disclose the gap, not to enter zero as if disposal were free of emissions.
- Omitting production scrap. Purchased mass exceeds in-product mass by the yield factor. A1 and A2 run on purchased mass; reporting them on net mass understates the upstream footprint.
- Choosing economic allocation first. ISO 14044 requires avoiding allocation, then physical allocation, before economic allocation. Starting with revenue shares is a hierarchy violation that distorts co-product footprints.
- Comparing products on a declared unit when a functional unit is needed. Two products that deliver the same service but differ in mass cannot be compared per kilogram; the comparison must be per unit of function.
- Mixing GWP bases within a line total. AR6 corporate-reporting factors and AR5 DEFRA-basis factors are not interchangeable within a single sum. Keep each line on its source’s defined basis.
- Treating a static use-stage assumption as fact. A 12-year service life on today’s grid intensity ignores grid decarbonisation. Where the use stage dominates, model the grid trajectory or state the static-grid assumption plainly.
Data Sources, Factor Provenance, and Uncertainty
All factors are read live from the MasterBrain at calculation time and traceable to their primary publications.
- Material A1–A3 and end-of-life modules — ÖKOBAUDAT 2024, the German federal construction-materials EPD database, structured by EN 15804 life-cycle module. Some modules, including Module D recovery credits, are published on an AR5 GWP-100 basis at source.
- Plastics end-of-life — IPCC 2006 Guidelines, Volume 5 (Waste), incineration defaults where the EPD does not declare a C-module.
- Grid electricity — DEFRA / UK location-based grid factor (DEFRA conversion factors), AR5 GWP-100 by DEFRA convention.
- Transport distances — RICS Whole Life Carbon Assessment Table 17 default scenarios for inbound and outbound freight.
- Refrigerant GWP — IPCC AR6 100-year values, applied where a refrigerant use-stage archetype is active.
- Biogenic carbon uptake — stoichiometric ratio of 3.667 kg CO₂ per kg biogenic carbon.
Uncertainty
EPD-derived A1–A3 factors are market-average values; a product made with a specific supplier’s verified factor will differ, sometimes substantially, from the catalogue average. End-of-life and use-stage assumptions carry the largest uncertainty in most cradle-to-grave footprints — the use-stage figure depends on a service-life estimate and a grid-intensity assumption that compound over years. Where a category is material to the total, supplier-specific primary data and a modelled grid trajectory tighten the result considerably over catalogue defaults.
Methodology Notes and Limitations
Boundary is declared, not assumed. The calculator produces a cradle-to-grave total, but the modules included depend on the archetype and inputs you select. State the boundary and the included modules in your study report so the figure is interpretable.
End-of-life coverage is EPD-driven. The C total sums whichever C-modules each material’s EPD declares. A missing module is disclosed as a coverage gap, not zero-filled. For non-bio products the end-of-life route mix does not change the fossil C figure — it redistributes biogenic carbon, which is absent in a non-bio product.
Module D and biogenic carbon are memos. Both are reported beside the headline and never netted into it. Offsets and carbon-neutrality claims are out of scope for the PCF and handled under ISO 14068-1.
GWP basis is mixed by design. Corporate-reporting line items use AR6 GWP-100; DEFRA-sourced grid and fuel factors and some ÖKOBAUDAT modules carry AR5 GWP-100 as part of their published definition. The two bases are not converted or mixed within a single line total — see the basis reconciliation in the methodology panel above.
Use-stage grid is static unless modelled. The default scenario holds grid intensity constant across the service life. Where grid decarbonisation materially affects a long-lived energy-using product, apply the grid-decarbonisation rate input rather than relying on the static default.
Frequently Asked Questions
Cradle-to-gate covers raw materials, inbound transport, and manufacturing — it stops at the factory gate (modules A1–A3). Cradle-to-grave extends through distribution (A4), the use stage (B), and end-of-life (C). For an energy-using product the use stage often dominates, so a gate-only footprint can understate the full impact by an order of magnitude. Use gate when your product is someone else’s input; use grave when your product is used and disposed of in the form you sell it.
No. A PCF under ISO 14067 is a gross inventory figure. Offsets are excluded from the inventory and a carbon-neutrality claim is a separate assertion governed by ISO 14068-1, made after the footprint is quantified. The same applies to the Module D recovery credit and biogenic carbon uptake — both are reported beside the headline, never subtracted from it.
A declared unit describes the product — per piece, per kg, per m², per m³. A functional unit describes the job the product does, used when comparing products that deliver the same service but differ physically. Two insulation boards compared per kilogram may rank differently from the same boards compared per square metre at equal thermal performance, because the lighter one needs more material to do the same job. ISO 14067 §6.4.2 requires the unit to be stated explicitly.
For a product made of fossil-based materials like steel and plastic, the end-of-life carbon comes from each material’s declared EPD C-modules, which are fixed values. The route mix (recycle / incinerate / landfill) only redistributes biogenic carbon, of which a non-bio product has none — so changing the recycle percentage does not change the fossil C figure. Where recycling shows up as a benefit is in the Module D recovery credit, which is reported separately. For bio-based products like timber or paper, the route mix does move the biogenic memo.
Use ISO 14067 for an internationally recognised, carbon-only product claim, especially when aligning with an EPD. Use the GHG Protocol Product Standard when the footprint feeds a corporate inventory already built on GHG Protocol scopes. Use the EU Product Environmental Footprint when making an environmental claim into the EU market where a PEF Category Rule exists. All three share the ISO 14040/14044 LCA backbone, so a cradle-to-grave figure computed on the ISO 14067 basis is directly usable for GHG Protocol Product reporting and as the carbon line of a PEF study.
Corporate GHG reporting defaults to IPCC AR6 GWP-100. DEFRA-sourced grid electricity and fuel factors carry AR5 GWP-100 as part of their published definition, and some ÖKOBAUDAT EPD modules are published on an AR5 basis at source. These bases are not converted or mixed within a single line total — each line stays on its source’s defined basis. The asymmetry is by design, not an inconsistency.
Module D, in the EN 15804 structure, captures the benefit of reuse, recovery, and recycling that occurs beyond the product’s system boundary — the avoided emissions when recovered material displaces virgin material elsewhere. Because that benefit accrues outside the assessed product’s life cycle, it is reported as a separate line and never netted into the cradle-to-grave headline. In the worked example it is a −6.7 kg credit that sits beside, not inside, the 258.2 kg total.
Environmental product declarations declare only the life-cycle modules their product category rules require and their data supports. C3 (waste processing) is effectively universal, but C1, C2, and C4 appear only where the EPD reports them — concrete and plastics, for instance, carry no C4 in ÖKOBAUDAT 2024. The calculator sums whatever modules each material declares and tags the coverage rather than entering zero for a missing module, because a data gap is something to disclose, not an emission-free assumption.