Environmental Regulations & Laws Decoded

The EU’s Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation is live and the real action now shifts to...

If Europe is one giant jobsite, the Digital Product Passport is the site log that follows every...

If Europe is on your roadmap, the new Construction Products Regulation sets fresh rules for CE...

If you make or sell physical products in the EU, the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation...

Public buyers in the EU spend close to €2 trillion each year, roughly 13.6–15% of GDP, and many of...

If project teams keep asking how your products help their LEED score, this is your crib sheet. We...

Plenty of manufacturers still ask, “Do we have to publish an EPD?” The short answer: sometimes. The...

A quiet deadline is racing toward every factory gate in Europe. The Ecodesign for Sustainable...

If you sell construction products in the EU or Great Britain, 2025 is a threshold year. New CPR...

Making sense of BREEAM’s Materials category is the difference between being shortlisted and being...

Massachusetts just tightened its Stretch and Specialized Energy Codes again. New electrification...

Architects ask for LEED points on nearly every mid-to-large project. If your materials cannot help...

California’s embodied‑carbon law is moving from concept to compliance. If your products touch...

Contractors on Washington state projects are beginning to ask for EPDs, HPDs, and facility details...

When LEED v4 landed, EPDs felt like extra credit. With v5, they are a front-row requirement. Every...

Pouring concrete in Berkeley now comes with a simple, high‑impact rule: cut cement in every mix by...

CE marking alone no longer cuts it. The recast EU Construction Products Regulation (effective 7...

AI, BIM, EPDs—you finally felt caught up, then Brussels dropped the Digital Product Passport....

France just ratcheted down the carbon caps for new buildings. If your product’s footprint is...

California’s July 2024 CALGreen supplement quietly flipped the script on embodied carbon. Large...

Caltrans has shifted EPDs from buzzword to bid requirement. Starting with steel and flat glass and...

California just put a price signal on the carbon inside building materials. AB 43 authorizes an...

Public buyers are tightening the screws: no verified Environmental Product Declaration, no seat at...

Across the US and Europe, public buyers have put Environmental Product Declarations on the...

The EU just gave every product a sustainability scorecard. Miss the requirements and your next...

Corporate climate reporting is about to rub shoulders with product-level documentation....

Article 37 just made Boston the toughest proving ground for new buildings. If your products feed...

On April 9 2024 the LA City Council instructed building-safety officials to write embodied-carbon...

California is tightening the screws on embodied-carbon. From 1 January 2025, structural steel,...

New York City’s new Clean and Circular Design & Construction Guidelines turn circularity from a...

Dutch procurement officers no longer skim over green claims, they measure them in euros. A single...

LEED v5 flips the script: before a project can claim even its first point, the team must tally the...

California tightened the screws on state purchasing. If your product supplies steel, rebar, flat...

Getting your product specified on BREEAM-certified projects can open doors to high-value...

Embodied-carbon caps are tightening across the UK. The pilot UK Net Zero Carbon Building Standard,...

On July 10 2025, Austin becomes the first major U.S. city to fold Appendix BL of the 2024...

Border taxes on carbon are no longer a Brussels thought experiment. The EU’s Carbon Border...

If your products land in Massachusetts state-aided housing, life-cycle assessments are moving from...

Corporate fit-out giants eyeing the Square Mile have a new rulebook: reuse before rebuild. The City...

A one-page bill could tip Nebraska’s climate strategy from passive to proactive by standing up an...

Federal bids move at sprint speed. GSA can award a construction contract in as little as 60 days,...

Dallas voters green-lit a $1.25 billion bond package that now comes with a sharp new string...

Two freshly filed code proposals—RE196-24 and RE137-24—aim to drag embodied carbon from the...

Bidding on a French building project without an FDES feels like showing up at Cannes without a...

Nebraska lawmakers are weighing L.B.164, a bill that would pour up to $46.5 million a year into...

The Concrete and Asphalt Innovation Act now moving through Congress could reshape how every U.S....

Andover, Massachusetts just turned its climate roadmap into near‑term building action by adopting...

Europe’s Construction Products Regulation just hit refresh. As of 7 January 2025, every CE-marked...

Selling into San Francisco without understanding its construction and demolition debris rules is...

Washington’s new operating budget quietly earmarks cash to turn the state’s “Buy Clean & Buy Fair”...

If your concrete, asphalt, steel, or even refrigerator ends up on Illinois-funded jobs, Senate Bill...

Pennsylvania’s House Resolution 83 tells the Joint State Government Commission to figure out...

A pair of twin bills—A8456 in the Assembly and S7998 in the Senate—would bake a 15 percent...

California’s Climate‑Related Financial Risk Act (SB 261) is paused by a court order, yet it is...

If your products touch concrete in California, Santa Monica just turned up the heat. The city now...

Colorado now sets hard global warming potential limits for key materials on state-funded projects....

Developers in Emeryville can trade verifiable community benefits for extra height, FAR, and...

New Jersey just opened a $500 million pot of tax credits for manufacturers who invest at least $10...

Trying to sell concrete, steel, or asphalt into Port Authority projects without an Environmental...

Massachusetts is poised to make every cubic yard of concrete, ton of rebar, and square-foot of...

EPDs are edging from nice-to-have to ticket-to-play. Texas lawmakers just poured fresh concrete on...

Los Angeles just strapped a booster pack onto California’s already-tough CALGreen code. Starting...

Virginia lawmakers flirted with a 20 percent income-tax credit for buying asphalt-recycling...

Emeryville, California hands developers up to 50 hard-won points—and extra height and floor...

Colorado just rewired its popular C-PACE financing to reward low-carbon construction materials. SB...

State DOTs finally have a federal playbook for low-carbon roadways. The FHWA Sustainable Pavements...

Hidden in Washington’s new two-year operating budget is a tidy $1.112 million line item to stand up...

Washington legislators have packed a lot into HB 1458: mandatory product-specific EPDs in the 2024...

Colorado recycles just 16 percent of its waste—half the national average (Eco-Cycle, 2023)....

Minnesota is weighing whether to fold Appendix BL (hemp-lime “hempcrete”) and Appendix BJ...

Beacon Hill is weighing HD.3507, a bill that would turn embodied-carbon data into a ticket of entry...

Ready-mix, precast, or masonry—if your plant ships 50 cubic yards of concrete to a state-funded...

Minnesota’s latest transportation finance bill quietly sets aside $310,000 to help concrete,...

A new Washington bill puts facility-specific EPDs on the critical path for any project over roughly...

Sales‐tax exemption on concrete, steel, asphalt, and other materials in New York will soon hinge on...

The Concrete Carbon Utilization, Reduction, and Removal Breakthrough Act (HB 5461) almost turned...

Architects across Europe are starting to ask suppliers for numbers that plug straight into the EU’s...

State "Buy Clean" laws are moving from feel-good slogans to hard carbon caps. Miss the limit and...

Oregon’s 2023 climate package is not just about forests and heat pumps. It quietly rewires...

The Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive keeps shapeshifting: first the 2022 headlines,...

Minnesota already shells out more than $2 billion a year on goods and services for public projects...

Tender documents across the UK now slip a quiet question into the technical specs: “Show evidence...

Eight and a half percent. That is the average sales-tax bite on every cubic yard of concrete,...

Congress just set aside $200 million for low-carbon cement and asphalt R&D plus new cash bonuses on...

New Hampshire’s H.B.306 never made it off the House table this February, but it spotlights a...

Olympia just green-lit $7.6 billion in bricks, wires, and rebar for the 2025-27 biennium (HB...

AI training campuses are rising faster than substation upgrades. Owners are racing to cut both...

Voluntary checklists once passed in bid rooms. Not anymore. Owners, states, and rating systems now...

Land a cloud contract and you also inherit a sustainability homework list any building-product...

A 20 percent tax credit on asphalt-recycling machinery sounds nice. Match it with a carbon-smart...

Pennsylvania’s House Bill 505 would pump hundreds of millions of new utility dollars into...

Ann Arbor, Michigan quietly passed a 2021 resolution that tells its architects, engineers and...

Starting March 1 2025, every site-plan application in Mississauga must tick off a revamped Green...

A quick heads-up for any manufacturer shipping into the Empire State: New York’s fresh S6931A bill...

Sydney’s cranes are not just lifting steel beams, they are lifting a new carbon rulebook. From...

Michigan’s House Bill 5567 looks small on paper—a two-page amendment that simply orders a study—but...

Connecticut is flirting with a procurement rule that would give state-funded buildings a clear...

Most manufacturers breathed a sigh of relief when Buy Clean only covered four materials. SB 755...

A bill now moving through Albany would turn New York’s current “please disclose” embodied-carbon...

Connecticut lawmakers have floated HB 6784, a bill that would dangle new incentives in front of...

A one-page bill rarely rattles product teams, but Illinois House Bill 3141 does just that. Starting...

Massachusetts wants to pour $300 million into making old buildings all-electric, energy-tight, and...

Construction and demolition debris already dwarfs household trash, clocking in at 600 million tons...

Hawaii just told its Department of Health to assemble a Demolition Waste Reduction Working Group....

Aloha State lawmakers want to know if public projects can swap out high-carbon concrete, steel, and...

Carbon rules are changing faster than a TikTok trend. Federal pullbacks in Washington sit beside...

Vermont quietly added an embodied‑carbon twist to its residential energy code. Section R408 puts...

Adaptive reuse in Pittsburgh is not just preservation. Under Section 915.07.D of the Zoning Code,...

New York City is turning circular construction from a buzzword into bid language. If your products...

Minnesota’s Buy Clean Buy Fair law is moving from ideas to bid specs. If your concrete, steel, or...

Cambridge ties zoning approvals for larger projects to green building outcomes. That means spec...

Maryland is turning embodied carbon from a talking point into a bid requirement. If you sell cement...

Colorado turned embodied carbon into a line item you can erase. Under SB 22-051, qualifying low...

Compliance quesionnaires arrive just when product teams are busiest. They mix chemistry rules,...

Most teams still hold a single, network-average EPD while sales lives in a world of thousands of...

Public buyers in the UK now score every major tender on social value. If your team sells into...

Selling into UK public projects changed on 24 February 2025. Buyers can lean harder into...

Portland just put real money behind commercial deconstruction. That means more projects salvaging...

Oregon is paying for lower-carbon housing, and product EPDs are the receipts. The state’s...

Massachusetts just hardwired clean energy growth into law while pointing procurement toward...

Aspen, Colorado now requires large projects to separate recoverable construction and demolition...

Denver is testing a clear idea: pay teams that cut upfront emissions on large new projects and...

Washington, DC just gave adaptive reuse a one-two punch. One program rewards office-to-housing...

Selling steel, cement, aluminum, fertilisers, hydrogen, or electricity into the EU now comes with a...

Federal projects in Canada run on a tight Integrated Design Process. If your product shows up late...

Bankers ask for Taxonomy alignment. Developers ask for whole life carbon. Sales hears both in...

The EU’s 2030 climate and energy rules are not background noise. They change the cost and...

Canada has quietly turned life cycle assessment into a two-for-one play. LCA^2 pairs product-level...

Selling into Denmark just got more exacting. BR18’s climate rules already require building LCAs,...

Digital Product Passports will force building‑product makers to replace high‑level material blurbs...

Selling into the EU is about to feel different. Environmental data that once lived in optional...

2026 is the year packaging, PFAS, and EPR rules stop feeling hypothetical and start shaping specs,...

Short answer: no, LEED does not mandate Environmental Product Declarations for every project. Smart...

California’s embodied‑carbon program is moving from generic association EPDs to verified Type III...

If a spec asks for whole of life carbon in New Zealand, the question behind it is simple. Can you...

Toronto’s code is no longer just about efficient boilers and tight envelopes. Version 4 pushes...

Norway is a unitary state, yet national rules now shape how every public buyer scores climate...

If Oslo is in your spec pipeline, clean construction rules are no longer theory. They affect how...

Selling into the EU now carries a carbon cover charge. If a product’s embedded emissions are high...

If Europe is part of your sales map, the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive is not...

Ecodesign used to be a back‑of‑the‑lab exercise. With the EU’s Ecodesign for Sustainable Products...

Selling into the Netherlands often hinges on one number. The Environmental Cost Indicator, or MKI,...

Selling into Norway’s built environment is changing fast. Climate accounts are now part of building...

If Singapore is on your growth map, the Green Building Masterplan is the playbook. It shapes what...

Selling into Sweden or supplying a project there? Climate declarations for new buildings are...

Bids to Trafikverket live or die on Klimatkalkyl results. If your products show up with generic...

Selling into Sweden or supplying a Nordic project and hearing “climate declaration” at kickoff?...

Sweden treats carbon like cost in roads and rails. If a supplier cannot show credible,...

Selling into Swiss public projects can feel like decoding a watch movement. The gears that matter...

Zurich’s public builders set the bar high. On city projects, Minergie-P-ECO is the default and...

If your products land in Swiss projects, Minergie-ECO is likely on the spec sheet. It layers...

Permitting in the Netherlands already checks a building’s material footprint via MPG. From July 1,...

Selling into Dutch public projects lives and dies on tender criteria. The MVI SPP Tool bundles...

Dutch infra procurement now treats carbon like cost. If your products feed clean, verified data...

Confused about how a 2013 Dutch Green Deal still shapes today’s specs and EPD choices? Green Deal...

If infrastructure tenders in the Netherlands are on your radar, DuboCalc is the scoreboard. It...

Selling into Dutch tenders hinges on one thing buyers can score fast: environmental performance...

London’s planning rules quietly decide who gets specified. Whole-life carbon assessments and...

Barnsley is moving Whole Life Carbon from nice-to-have to must-file. If your products land in major...

Making sales in the Royal Borough is getting greener and sharper. The council’s climate strategy is...

If your products land in projects across Plymouth, South Hams, or West Devon, the Climate Emergency...

Working on projects in Bath and North East Somerset? Large schemes now need a third‑party verified...

Specs teams face a maze of guidance, consultations and client rules. Here’s the short list of...

The Act sets the tempo for everything carbon in the UK. It does not order you to publish EPDs, yet...

The UK’s Clean Growth Strategy is not a museum piece. It still shapes how projects are planned,...

If your products land on Seattle projects, deconstruction rules shape schedules, salvage flows, and...

Boston is moving from “demo” to “disassemble.” The City tested deconstruction on a handful of real...

Maryland’s Climate Solutions Now Act of 2022 set the state’s building sector on a firm...

Wisconsin’s Clean Energy Plan is more than energy headlines. It is a quiet shift in how public...

Washington’s Executive Order 20-01 quietly rewired how state projects buy, build, and measure...

Selling into public projects around Seattle just got more specific. King County’s 2025 Strategic...

San Antonio’s Climate Ready plan is being updated in August 2025. That puts new attention on both...

Austin set a citywide target to reach net‑zero by 2040 and to cut the embodied carbon of building...

City jobs and specs are tilting toward reuse. If your products show up in Pittsburgh capital...

Specs are increasingly written so a product without a verified EPD starts the race a lap behind....

If Portland is on your bid map, the Climate Emergency Workplan is not background noise. It now...

Eugene, Oregon quietly flipped the script on public works concrete. Beginning in 2025, city...

A small New York village just turned low-carbon concrete from a talking point into a scoring...

New York’s Climate Action Council Scoping Plan turns climate goals into procurement rules that now...

Minnesota is tightening the screws on climate pollution and material transparency. If your products...

Michigan’s Healthy Climate Plan is reshaping energy, codes, and public spending. Does it force EPDs...

Cambridge, Massachusetts sharpened its building decarbonization playbook with a 2021 Net Zero...

Massachusetts’ Executive Order 594 quietly rewired state construction. It sets hard emissions...

If LEED is the playlist owners use to pick buildings, USGBC is the DJ. Manufacturers that show up...

Local climate plans now shape spec sheets. Amherst, Massachusetts adopted its Climate Action,...

Evanston just turned its climate plan into sharper building rules. If your products end up in...

Specs in Honolulu increasingly ask for carbon‑mineralized concrete. If your mixes are ready but...

On December 16, 2025, the European Commission adopted a delegated act that standardises how to...

The EU just locked in the first Construction Products Regulation Working Plan. It spells out which...

France’s RE2020 hits its 2025 step while the government rolls out a new digital attestations...

Here’s the simple truth. LEED certifies buildings, not products. Yet products can help projects...

Owners keep asking for buildings that use no net energy over a year. Design teams then turn to...

Owners keep asking for “zero carbon.” Some mean LEED Zero Carbon, others mean a LEED v5 project...

France tightened RE2020 carbon caps in 2025. If your product data is not in INIES, project teams...

France’s RE2020 sets hard caps on the carbon of new buildings and tightens those caps in steps. If...

If France is on your roadmap, RE2020 is the rulebook that decides whether your products help a...

France tightened RE2020 carbon rules on January 1, 2025. If your products go into French housing,...

France’s RE2020 sets hard carbon and energy caps for new buildings. The 2025 step tightened the...

If Europe is on your sales map, the Construction Products Regulation shapes how your products...

IECC 2027 is locking in by late 2026, then rolling into state adoptions on their own timelines....

Net-zero is no longer a buzzword, it is a score on the LEED chart that architects track as closely...