How Permasteelisa reduced carbon by 15% with project-specific EPDs

Addressing embodied carbon in custom façades

Façades account for a significant proportion of a building's embodied carbon, often ranking just behind primary structural elements. Given the custom nature of Permasteelisa’s façade systems, quantifying and reducing environmental impacts accurately on each individual project can be challenging. Variability in materials, design, and assembly methods per project makes standardization difficult, while risks of data misinterpretation, omissions, and double counting further complicate accurate LCA calculations. Complex global supply chains also contribute significantly to transportation emissions.

Deploying One Click LCA for project-specific assessments

Permasteelisa adopted One Click LCA to streamline its sustainability strategy, ensuring accurate data extraction from 2D and 3D models while integrating supplier-specific EPDs and custom material profiles from the Ecoinvent database. One Click LCA’s platform enables scenario analysis for design optioneering, identifying the most effective low-carbon material and assembly choices. It also facilitates granular tracking of emissions across the entire life-cycle, covering extraction, manufacturing, transportation, and installation.

Permasteelisa has been able to leverage the advantage of using One Click LCA in optimizing design iterations by engaging with their clients early in the process, ensuring that sustainability is embedded in the design phase.

Achieving measurable carbon reductions: The UCB Gateway Project

In UC Berkeley’s Gateway Project, Permasteelisa successfully achieved a 15% reduction in Global Warming Potential (GWP) compared to Carbon Leadership Forum (CLF) industry baselines. This was accomplished through a combination of material efficiency optimization, supply chain adjustments incorporating low-carbon aluminum, and meticulous life-cycle monitoring. The use of One Click LCA enabled a detailed assessment of aluminum extrusions, glass thickness, and energy use, ensuring the most sustainable outcomes.

Identifying hotspots and driving optimization

Through One Click LCA, Permasteelisa identified that 80% of emissions stem from raw material extraction, manufacturing, and transportation (A1-A3 stages). Aluminum emerged as the dominant contributor, accounting for 60% of the façade’s embodied carbon footprint. Targeted optimizations such as increasing unit width, reducing shading fin size, and refining material sourcing strategies led to a 30% reduction in embodied carbon. Further supply chain interventions, including sourcing low-carbon aluminum and regionalizing production, enabled an additional 55-60% reduction in emissions.

Using One Click LCA uncovered insights about materials that were, at times, counter-intuitive: a relatively low-carbon material, such as terracotta, was actually carbon-intensive because of the additional substructure required to support it. The weight of terracotta in a high-seismic region like California requires a heavy aluminum framework, leading to increased embodied carbon despite terracotta’s inherently low material emissions. This demonstrates how material choices must be evaluated in a system-wide context rather than in isolation.

Expanding LCA-driven sustainability across projects

“The other main advantage that we have using One Click LCA is that we can create base templates that are based on the location where we are manufacturing, the production facility we are using, and the general supply chain information that we can then use on multiple projects and adapt to capture the small changes that might happen from one project to the next.”

-Andrea Zani, R&D Innovation Manager & Sustainability Lead, Permasteelisa

Building on the success of the UCB Gateway Project, Permasteelisa has expanded its sustainability efforts across multiple projects in North America and Europe. The company now employs project-specific EPDs for new tenders and has embedded LCA-driven decision-making at early project stages. Additionally, Permasteelisa is tracking Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions across its major business units, as part of their approach to hit to carbon neutrality by 2040.

The future of data-driven decarbonization in façades

Permasteelisa’s work with One Click LCA underscores the value of high-fidelity carbon tracking in complex construction projects. By integrating sustainability from the design phase, leveraging high-quality data, and refining supply chain strategies, the company is setting a new benchmark in low-carbon curtain wall systems.

By employing One Click LCA, Permasteelisa is not merely tracking embodied carbon — it is actively shaping the future of sustainable façades.

Using project-specific EPDs to drive decarbonization

Manufacturers looking to reduce embodied carbon and meet growing sustainability demands can streamline their approach with One Click LCA’s EPD Generator. The platform simplifies the creation of third-party verified and project-specific EPDs, ensuring compliance with global standards while enabling data-driven carbon reductions. Whether optimizing materials, refining supply chains, or responding to client sustainability requirements, manufacturers can integrate One Click LCA into their workflow to drive measurable impact.