Choosing a sustainable roofing system presents architects, building owners and specifiers with increasingly complicated decisions — changing government regulations, a proliferation of “green” products, and variations in roof color must all be weighed against cost considerations and design requirements. An important new measurement is emerging as a credible indicator of the overall sustainability of a roofing material – and one of the best guides to choosing a roof. It’s called Life Cycle Assessment, or LCA, and it provides a 360-degree view of a roofing material — from cradle to grave — providing an objective basis to make an informed decision. According to the American Center for Life Cycle Assessment, “Environmental Life Cycle Assessment is based on the very logical concept that if we knew all the environmental impacts of a product or service, we could make good environmental decisions about that product or service.”
EPDM roofing membrane accounts for more than 1 billion square feet of new roof coverings in the United States each year. Today, there are well over 500,000 warranted roof installations totaling more than 20 billion square feet of EPDM membrane in place nationwide. (Photo courtesy of Carlisle Construction Materials.)