BEES 4.0--free software tool for selecting environmentally preferred, cost-effective building products
NIST Building Software Offers Green Product Advice
Builders interested
both in conservation and thrift can benefit from the latest updates to an
innovative software package released this week by the National Institute of
Standards and Technology (NIST). BEES 4.0, the new version of NIST’s software
tool for selecting environmentally preferred, cost-effective building products,
updates data on more than 200 products and adds 30 new products for review. It
also offers users the option of a new set of consensus weights for scoring the
environmental impact of individual building products.
BEES 4.0 (Building
for Environmental and Economic Sustainability version 4) measures both the
environmental and economic performance of building products with life-cycle
assessment techniques developed respectively by the International Organization
of Standardization (ISO) and ASTM International.
With BEES a user can
ascertain, for instance, the environmental impact of a product at any stage of
its existenceraw material acquisition, manufacture, transportation,
installation, use, and recycling and waste management. The environmental
ramifications of the product at each of these stages is provided for each of 12
categories: global warming, acidification, eutrophication, fossil fuel
depletion, indoor air quality, habitat alteration, human health, ecological
toxicity, ozone depletion, smog, criteria air pollutants and water intake. The
new consensus weight option, developed by a panel of building product
manufacturers, green building designers and environmental assessment experts,
allows users to evaluate environmental impacts considering short-, medium- and
long-term effects.
Comprehensive economic performance data are similarly
available for the costs of initial investment, replacement, operation,
maintenance and repair, and disposal. Environmental and economic performances
are combined into an overall performance measure using the ASTM standard for
Multi-Attribute Decision Analysis. For the entire BEES analysis, building
products are defined and classified according to the ASTM standard
classification for building elements known as UNIFORMAT II.
BEES 4.0
includes a number of new non-biobased products, including carpeting from several
manufacturers who agree to purchase carbon credits to offset the product’s
life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions. These and other products, such as biobased
carpets, roof coatings, building maintenance products and fertilizers that
qualify for a government “green” preferential purchase program, could increase
builder participation in the nation’s green building drive.
The U.S.
Department of Agriculture Chief Economist’s Office of Energy Policy and New Uses
supported NIST’s BEES research on biobased products.
For more
information on BEES 4.0, which can be downloaded for free, visit www.bfrl.nist.gov/oae/software/bees.html <
http://www.bfrl.nist.gov/oae/software/bees.html
> .
Media Contact: John Blair, john.blair@nist.gov, (301)
975-4261
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Bobbie Lippiatt, BEES Developer
