OpenDAP is a database of environmental information on construction products. It is open to the collaboration of other organizations and institutions and any Environmental Product Declaration Program for the contribution of data and, for any life cycle analysis (LCA) calculation tool, with data exchange by means of import in ILCD+EPD format. OpenDAP is not a tool for the generation of Environmental Product Declaration (EPD), nor for the life cycle assessment of construction products, but a searchable database.
OpenDAP contributes to the Long-term Strategy for a modern, competitive and climate-neutral Spanish economy in 2050 approved by the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge and is included in the of public information data within the Aporta Initiative to promote the opening of public information and the development of advanced data-based services. Promoted by the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation and the Public Business Entity Red.es. OpenDAP is supported by the following Spanish Climate Change Office (Oficina Española de Cambio Climático, OECC).
OpenDAP follows the standards established in the InData Working Group . It is a European project to generate a network to harmonise environmental data, its exchange, format and quality.
The data published in OpenDAP are the property of their providers or developers, who are responsible for their content.
It is an official, public and freely accessible environmental database.
The most important European databases have a common search application based on the Soda4LCA browser, developed by the IAI (Institute for Applied Computer Science) and the JRC (European Commission Joint Research Centre).
Mainly building data, but can be extended to any sector.
Information on traceability and data quality according to prEN 15941: 2021. Sustainability of construction works - Data quality for assessment of construction products and construction works - Selection and use of data.
International projection and union, link with European databases through the ILCD+EPD format and presence in the InData project database.
OpenDAP contains generic data (obtained from bibliographic sources and industry average data), and EPD, with average and specific information. It meets quality criteria related to temporal, geographical and technological representativeness and addresses aspects of accuracy, completeness, representativeness, consistency and data sources.
OpenDAP is a database developed by the Advanced and Sustainable Construction (Construcción Avanzada y Sostenible, CAS) research group of the Eduardo Torroja Institute of Construction Sciences (Instituto de Ciencias de la Construcción Eduardo Torroja, IETcc) belonging to the State Agency Scientific Research Council (Agencia Estatal Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, CSIC).
The Advanced and Sustainable Construction (CAS) research group, which belongs to the Department of Construction, has three main lines of research: industrialisation and digital transformation, building and non-building energy and sustainability. Based on these, it aims to develop technology and new materials, products and construction systems that offer advantages over existing ones, always under the premise of being more sustainable.
From a broad point of view that encompasses the development of new construction tools (materials, processes and services) with better performance, functionalities (multifunctional) and capacities, aimed at satisfying the well-being of the user and society in an environmentally friendly way. The Advanced and Sustainable Construction group seeks to envision the construction of the future as a way to adapt to and mitigate climate change.
The group focuses its activity on the participation in different research projects obtained in public, national and European calls, in the collaboration and support to R&D&I activities of the agents and the industry of the sector and in knowledge transfer activities.
The duardo Torroja Institute of Construction Sciences (IETcc) bases its activity on scientific research and technological developments in the field of construction and its materials.
In the field of sustainability, studies associated with the problems of climate change, resources and the environment are addressed, as well as the energy efficiency of buildings during their construction, use and demolition. Circular economy and life cycle analysis are present as transversal axes of development.
These objectives are achieved through the development of R&D&I projects, financed by the National Research Plan, the European Union and the Autonomous Communities, as well as through research contracts with companies in the construction sector.
The State Agency Scientific Research Council (CSIC) is the largest public research institution in Spain and the third largest research organisation in the European Union. Attached to the Ministry of Science and Innovation, CSIC plays a key role in Spanish and world science and technology policy.
According to its Statute (art. 4), the mission of the CSIS is to promote, coordinate, develop and disseminate multidisciplinary scientific and technological research in order to contribute to the advancement of knowledge and to economic, social and cultural development, as well as to train personnel and advise public and private entities in these areas.
The CSIC has more than 10,000 employees, of which almost 4,000 are permanent researchers. It currently has 120 institutes spread throughout the country, of which 67 are owned by the CSIC itself and 53 are Joint Research Units in collaboration with other Spanish universities or research institutions.
The concept of "sustainability" appeared for the first time in the 1987 Brundtland Report prepared by several countries for the United Nations Organization (UN). It arose from the need to study and define the impact of human activities on the environment.
According to the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development, sustainable development is "meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs".
This definition extends to a triple strand: Sustainability is Environmental Life Cycle Analysis (nature and biodiversity), Life Cycle Cost Analysis (economic development) and Social Life Cycle Analysis (quality of life).
Source: Authors' own creation
All this is embodied in the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development (1992), adopted at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (second Earth Summit) in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). It laid the foundations for the pursuit of global political strategies, and among other outcomes the Agenda 21, an action plan for sustainable development, and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, with issues to be addressed at global, national and local levels to achieve sustainable development.
Agenda 21 will be the starting point for the development of the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) set by the UN in 2000, with 8 global priority human development goals. In 2015 they were revised, giving rise to a new global agenda called Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) within the 2030 Agenda.
The depletion of natural resources and the negative effects of environmental degradation, including desertification, drought, land degradation, freshwater scarcity and biodiversity loss, increase and exacerbate the challenges facing humankind. Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time and its adverse effects undermine the ability of all countries to achieve sustainable development. Rising global temperatures, rising sea levels, ocean acidification and other effects of climate change are severely affecting coastal areas and low-lying coastal countries, including many least developed countries and small island developing States. The survival of many societies and the planet's biological support systems is at risk.
From 25-27 September 2015, Heads of State and Government and High Representatives at UN Headquarters agreed on the new global Sustainable Development Goals. Approved by 193 countries, establishing 17 goals and 169 targets, calling this agreement Agenda 2030.
The Sustainable Development Goals and their targets are integrated and indivisible, global in scope and universally applicable, taking into account the different realities, capacities and levels of development of each country and respecting their national policies and priorities.
On 29 June 2018, the "Action Plan for the implementation of the 2030 Agenda" was approved, which consists of two parts:
For more effective coordination, the High Level Group for the 2030 Agenda was created, which together with the Inter-Ministerial Working Group seeks to promote, analyse plans and strategies and ensure communication between all actors.
In 2020, the Ministry of Social Rights and the 2030 Agenda was created, which has been responsible for proposing and executing the Government's policy on the promotion, monitoring and cooperation for the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the fulfilment of the Sustainable Development Goals.
On the one hand, the Secretary of State for Agenda 2030 chairs the Sustainable Development Council, whose functions are to advise the Secretary, disseminate and promote dialogue between social, economic, environmental and cultural agents. On the other hand, the General Directorate of Leveraging Policies provides technical support to the Secretariat, coordinates and monitors the lever policies that allow accelerating the achievement of the SDGs.
Source: Action plan for the implementation of the 2030 Agenda.
Within the SDGs, the Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda (Ministerio de Transporte, Movilidad y Agenda Urbana, MITMA) is responsible for SDG 9, which aims to "Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialisation and foster innovation" and more specifically SDG 11, which seeks to "Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable". In developing the implementation of the latter, it is already working on the Spanish Urban Agenda.
MITMA's areas of competence include access to housing, building, urban planning, land and architecture. With regard to building, its basic criteria are the promotion of energy efficiency and sustainable development, the guarantee of accessibility to avoid discrimination of people with disabilities and to favour their mobility, and the application of innovations and new technologies. And, in the field of urban planning and urban sustainability, one of the most important challenges currently facing urban planning is sustainable territorial and urban development. In other words, that of continuing to contribute to progress without forgetting the requirements and the triple dimension (economic, social and environmental) of sustainability, and in particular, understanding land, in addition to being an economic resource, as one of the most valuable natural elements at our disposal, and in whose regulation it is necessary to combine a whole series of different factors: the environment, quality of life, energy efficiency, the provision of services, social cohesion, etc. All of this is set out in article 3, Principle of Sustainable Territorial and Urban Development, within the Royal Legislative Decree 7/2015, of 30 October.
In 2001, by Royal Decree 376/2001, the Spanish Office for Climate Change was created as a collegiate body under the Directorate General for Environmental Quality and Assessment of the Ministry of the Environment to develop policies related to climate change. Some of its functions include the formulation of national climate change policy, in accordance with international and European Union regulations on the subject, as well as the proposal of regulations and the development of planning and administrative instruments that enable the objectives established by this policy to be met. Carrying out and promoting information and dissemination activities on climate change. Liaising with European institutions, public administrations, non-governmental organisations, public and private institutions and entities and other social agents to collaborate in initiatives related to the fight against climate change.
Life Cycle Thinking involves a form of analysis that goes beyond the traditional approach. It is about reducing resource use and environmental emissions by considering all the processes involved throughout the life cycle of a product and/or service (cradle to grave). Considering the stages of production, distribution, use and end of life; avoiding transporting loads to other phases of the life cycle, to other geographical areas and other categories. Obtaining results in the location of possible hidden defects, adopting a quantitative approach and helping to make decisions that lead to a real environmental improvement.
As stated in ISO 14040, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is the "Collection and evaluation of inputs, outputs and potential environmental impacts of a product system throughout its life cycle".
Structure of the Life Cycle Assessment (Source: SOFIAS calculation tool)
Catalogue of standards drawn up by the AEN/CTN 198 "Sustainability in Construction" committee:
Technical Committee ISO/TC 59/SC17 (Sustainability in buildings and civil engineering works) has the following catalogue of standards.
The main features of OpenDAP for the user are:
OpenDAP is open to collaboration with providers and developers who can be:
OpenDAP collects data from research projects and studies related to impact assessment.
You can contact us.
OpenDAP has developed a working format to introduce the EPDs developed under a Programme Manager and verified. Giving value to the EPD in pdf format and transforming it to ILCD+EPD format, exportable, readable and compatible with the rest of European databases. COLLABORATE WITH US.
The group is a member of the InData working group as a representative of Spain. The aim of WG InData is the initiation of a European LCA data network structure for construction products based on DAP information in a preferential way. Today, WG InData is growing with new members, and is still open for new additions. Currently, the member countries are Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United Kingdom. It consists of public and research institutions, DAP programme managers and experts.
Part of the work relates to the following aspects:
In the SC1 working group within the CTN 198, José Antonio Tenorio Ríos, principal investigator of the group, is its president; and another member of the research group, Sheila Otero Seseña, is a member of this committee. In the Technical Committee for Standardisation 198 - Sustainability in Construction and its European counterpart CEN/TN 350 - Sustainability of Construction work, where the activity of the group is carried out, the group has been involved in the development and implementation of a number of projects. Construction work, where the standardisation activity of activities on sustainability in construction is developed, taking into account the three necessary approaches: environmental, economic and social. Including working groups on building (SC 1), civil works (SC 2), materials (SC 3) and product sustainability (WG1).Comité Técnico de Normalización 198 – Sostenibilidad en la Construcción y su homólogo europeo CEN/TN 350 Sustainability of Construction work, donde se desarrolla la actividad de normalización de las actividades sobre sostenibilidad en la construcción, teniendo en cuenta las tres aproximaciones necesarias: medioambiental, económica y social. Incluyendo grupos de trabajo en edificación (SC 1), obra civil (SC 2), materiales (SC 3) y sostenibilidad del producto (GT1). Dentro del grupo de trabajo en la edificación (SC1), José Antonio Tenorio Ríos, investigador principal del grupo, es su presidente; y otro miembro del grupo de investigación, Sheila Otero Seseña, es vocal en dicho comité.
The research group has been part of the innovation project Operational Group “Timber for Sustainable Building” (Grupo Operativo Madera Construcción Sostenible, GO MADERA), Smart tool for the selection of timber products aimed at construction industry. Innovation Project co-financed 80% by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) of the European Union and 20% by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, within the framework of the National Programme for Rural Development 2014-2020. Its main objective is to position wood products of national origin for construction in the market based on technical and environmental data of this material, highlighting its excellence and sustainable properties to create a relevant production and demand. In addition, the following specific objectives are pursued: To provide reliable information and technical data on wood products to facilitate prescription; To demonstrate through environmental information the excellence of wood as a construction material in relation to the values associated with sustainability; To provide a tool for the transmission of information on the technical and environmental characteristics of wood products for construction. Among the actions developed within the project, a series of EPDs of wood products have been calculated and published in the OpenDAP database.
Maderia. Spanish Wood Society, which is a non-profit Technical Association that brings together professionals and companies related to wood in order to unify efforts in promoting the use of wood in its various fields and applications. On its website you can find the intelligent search engine developed by the GO MADERA project.
OpenDAP has a public collaboration agreement with the Ecómetro Association to collaborate in the development of the database for the calculation of environmental impacts and the assessment of the carbon footprint of buildings. Providing generic data, with the appropriate traceability and quality. This association has developed a tool called Ecómetro to measure and visualise the impacts of architecture and urban planning on the Earth, to promote and accelerate its creation, facilitate its application and dissemination.
If you would like to contact us, please send an email to cas@ietcc.csic.es and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
EDUARDO TORROJA INSTITUTE OF CONSTRUCTION SCIENCES – CSIC
Research Group: Advanced and Sustainable Construction.
Serrano Galvache, 4, 28033 Madrid
