The Construction Products Ordinance 2026 is getting closer, green building systems are tightening their requirements, and manufacturers and planners are faced with a mountain of manual verification processes. Two new digital tools from the EPEA cooperation with DIE WERKBANK IT promise a remedy: ProCA automates product evaluation for manufacturers, Conpli digitizes project review for general contractors. The highlight: Both solutions are integrated into existing BIM workflows via the workbank-EPEA cooperation and transform complex Excel loops into compliance checks within seconds.

Why now? The regulatory era
“Sustainability has increasingly moved from an energy issue to a material issue,” explains Pascal Keppler, Team Manager Data Services & LCA at EPEA/Drees & Sommer. “The questions about the sustainability of construction products are simply becoming more and more relevant.” What began as voluntary certification in green building systems is becoming a tough business reality due to the EU taxonomy and the upcoming construction products regulation.

In concrete terms, this means that manufacturers must document the solvent content, absence of pollutants and CO₂ footprints of their products. Planners and general contractors check every single product for compliance with DGNB, BNB or EU taxonomy requirements. “It's very complex and very manual,” says Keppler.

ProCA: Automated product evaluation for manufacturers
‍ProCA is aimed directly at construction product manufacturers and automates the evaluation according to various sustainability systems. The process is deliberately streamlined: Manufacturers categorize their products and answer around 5-10 automatically generated questions about ingredients and properties. “These are usually questions that the manufacturer can answer anyway,” explains Keppler. “Companies are getting these inquiries anyway. ”
The system automatically generates declarations of conformity from this and provides the assessment results via cooperation platforms such as DGNB Navigator, Madaster or cockpit.planner and cockpit.producer available. The cost: 300 euros per product review. “If someone asks me about DGNB compliance, I can simply send them the declaration — everything is answered there.” Pascal Keppler, EPEA/Drees & Sommer

Conpli: Digital project management from the tendering phase
‍While ProCA starts by the manufacturer, optimizes Conpli project review for general contractors and sustainability coordinators. The tool is mainly used from service phase 6 when construction companies submit specific product suggestions.

Until now, the alternative has been to send Excel lists and ZIP folders back and forth by email, which is an absolute disaster.

Conpli is creating a joint database with single source of truth, mobile construction site approval and automatic version control. More than 50 projects are currently being carried out with Conpli, including complex pilot projects such as the ratisbona circular economy project at the LOOP market in Haimhausen. A particular added value: Conpli automatically creates as-built documentation (inventory documentation of the actual installed condition) and thus enables seamless building resource passes.

The connection to the Construction Products Ordinance 2026
The new tools are in line with the spirit of the times: From 2026, the product-specific requirements of the EU Construction Products Regulation will be gradually sharpened — starting with mass-relevant products such as concrete and steel, later expanded to all product groups until around 2032. “The topics of CO2 footprint, supply chain, circularity and pollutants are reappearing everywhere,” says Keppler.

If every manufacturer has to familiarise themselves with these regulations individually, this means an enormous amount of effort. ProCA and Conpli offer a consolidated solution: answered once, available for all systems.

Seamless integration: tools as connectors, not as silos
Integration into existing workflows is crucial for practicality. Both tools are deliberately designed as open systems: Manufacturer data from ProCA flows into various planning platforms, project reviews from Conpli automatically end up in material passes at Madaster. “We can integrate the evaluation results directly into the various platforms,” says Keppler, explaining the API-based connection. The principle: collect data once, use it many times — without creating new system breaks.

Outlook: AI integration and market penetration
As the next stage of development, EPEA is planning AI integration for automated data retrieval from product data sheets. The basic version of the tools is available free of charge. Keppler's recommendation for hesitant market participants is clear:

Just register and get started. Better think about how to make this process efficient — because the requirements come either way.

With ProCA and Conpli, our cooperation with EPEA creates new digital sustainability tools: not just for specialists, but for everyday planning tasks of tomorrow.