Knauf Insulation North America (KINA) is simplifying the process of researching and specifying building products that meet green building rating systems through a partnership with Sustainable Minds (SM).
Sustainable Minds is a provider of environmental product transparency applications, data, and services to help product manufacturers design and market greener products. It does so by presenting environmental performance data on building products in an understandable and credible way. By partnering with Sustainable Minds, KINA is simplifying the process of researching and specifying its insulation products for buildings that meet green building rating systems.
KINA uses SM Transparency Reports and SM Material Health Overviews to help AECs find environmental & material information in one place. The two organizations have also partnered to launch a Project Builder / Configurator & Library function within the SM Transparency Catalog.
“Knauf remains committed to staying at the forefront of sustainable building practices,” says Christopher Griffin, CEO, KINA. “We care about what goes into our products and how they are made. We are committed to creating product transparency disclosures for all our products to demonstrate our passion for manufacturing sustainable products that make a difference.”
KINA has listed 17 of its glass mineral wool insulation products across five CSI MasterFormat Divisions in the SM Transparency Catalog. The catalog is a cloud-based resource that makes it convenient to navigate product transparency information so architects and specifiers can find sustainable products. It also provides information on how to use these documents to earn credits through programs such as LEED v4, Collaborative for High Performance Schools, Green Globes, the Well Building Standard and the Living Building Challenge.
SM Transparency Reports provide not only the technical data required in Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs), but bring that data to life by telling the Knauf sustainability story across the product life cycle. All life cycle data included in the Transparency Reports is third-party verified by NSF International.
“Material ingredient and life cycle data can be tough to navigate, especially when trying to align with green building rating systems,” says Scott Miller, director of sustainability at KINA. “The partnership with Sustainable Minds simplifies this process; you can find everything about Knauf products in one place.”
KINA has partnered with Sustainable Minds to make the Transparency Catalog more user-friendly through the development of a Project Builder / Configurator & Library. Now, users can create projects in the Knauf Showroom and select, configure and save all the products and their Transparency Reports, Declare labels and Health Product Declarations (HPD) in a project library. This information can then be shared with colleagues online or downloaded for distribution.
“This initiative showcases what Knauf is doing to improve its products and makes it actionable for building professionals, transforming the way they approach specifying sustainable building products. The amount of information Knauf provides to make the LCA results understandable and meaningful is unparalleled,” says Terry Swack, CEO, Sustainable Minds. “Our goal with the Transparency Catalog is to reward those manufacturers who are making higher performing, greener and healthier products by getting their products selected and specified. The result is that greener buildings actually get built and everybody and the planet win.”