Environmental impact summaries for four types of North American lumber products are now available, the American Wood Council and the Canadian Wood Council said.

The “environmental product declarations,” or EPDs, list such things as the global warming potential, ozone depletion potential and fossil-fuel consumption for various categories of products. Thenew declarationscover softwood lumber, plywood, oriented strand board (OSB), and glue-laminated lumber.

“Business purchasing decisions will likely require the kind of environmental information provided by the EPDs in the future to account for factors such as carbon footprint,” the American Wood Council said.

These declarations are “cradle-to-gate” assessments, weighing the environmental impact from the harvest of raw materials to the point where products are ready to leave the manufacturer.