A BUILDING products firm has extended a scheme to “carbon label” its products.
Paving supplier Marshalls, which is based at Birkby and premises at Elland, revealed earlier this year carbon labels for more than 500 of its domestic products sold to DIY enthusiasts.
That made it the first company in the world to label an entire range of products – and the first in the hard landscaping industry – to work with the Carbon Trust’s labelling scheme.
Now it has extended the labelling to commercial products sold through builders’ merchants and for major schemes carried out by local authorities and Government departments.
The labels explain how much carbon dioxide equivalent was emitted from extracting and processing raw materials, manufacturing, distributing, and disposing of the products.
Marketing director Chris Harrop said: “When we started working with the Carbon Trust nearly three years ago we knew we were making a big commitment.
“But there’s no point in only carbon labelling one or two products. This is about providing information and a choice of products to compare.”
He added: “Carbon reduction is a key Government target as it is for Marshalls.
“If we are to build and create the kinds of spaces and landscapes that will help improve education, health and wellbeing, we have to understand the impact our products are having on the environment.
“This is why it’s so important for the commercial sector to understand carbon footprints – they can make their buying decisions based on impact and carbon reduction.”
Marshalls was one of 13 companies to work with the Carbon Trust on a pilot carbon labelling scheme which helped develop Publicly Available Specification (PAS) 2050.
The Carbon Trust and Defra worked with BSI British Standards to develop the UK standard for measuring the embodied greenhouse gas from products and services across their lifecycle that will be applicable to a wide range of sectors and product categories.
