The presence of plastic pipe is ubiquitous, but some might say its profile is low simply because plastic pipe is often out of sight, below ground or behind walls.

Yet plastic pipe connects Australia. It plays an essential and integral role in Australia’s built environment, the nation’s infrastructure, electricity transmission, agricultural irrigation, stock and domestic water supply and the mining and gas industries to name a few.

People who think plastic pipe is secondary to their lives might reflect on the fact that these products provide upwards of 85 per cent of the pipe infrastructure to major urban utilities for power and the reticulation of gas, water, and sewerage. The high proportion of plastic pipe and conduit in the delivery of these critical utilities reflects enormous confidence on the part of asset owners in the ability of these products to deliver long-term efficient performance.

But today, efficient performance is not enough. Given the widespread use of plastic pipes, it makes sense to ensure we better understand what we are dealing with.

Leading Vinyl Council and PIPA (Plastics Industry Pipe Association) member companies, Iplex and Vinidex, have recently published world-first product–specific Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) for their entire range of plastic pipe products. What is an EPD and why did the companies make this decision?

In ourlatest article published in Sourceable.net, PIPA’s executive general manager, Mark Heathcote elaborates on the drivers leading to these two major PVC pipe manufacturers separately taking the decision to publish EPDs for all of their pipe products, how it benefits the construction process and what lessons other product suppliers may learn from their experience.