EN 45557:2020

SLOVENSKI STANDARD
01-julij-2020
Splošna metoda za ocenjevanje deleža recikliranega materiala v proizvodih,
povezanih z energijo
General method for assessing the proportion of recycled material content in energy
related products
Allgemeines Verfahren zur Bewertung des Anteils an recyceltem Materials von
energieverbrauchsrelevanter Produkte
Méthode générale pour l’évaluation du contenu en matériaux recyclés des produits liés à
l’énergie
Ta slovenski standard je istoveten z: EN 45557:2020
ICS:
13.020.20 Okoljska ekonomija. Environmental economics.
Trajnostnost Sustainability
2003-01.Slovenski inštitut za standardizacijo. Razmnoževanje celote ali delov tega standarda ni dovoljeno.

EUROPEAN STANDARD
EN 45557
NORME EUROPÉENNE
EUROPÄISCHE NORM
April 2020
ICS 13.020.20
English version
General method for assessing the proportion of recycled
material content in energy-related products
Méthode générale pour l'évaluation du contenu en Allgemeines Verfahren zur Bewertung des Anteils an
matériaux recyclés des produits liés à l'énergie recyceltem Material von energieverbrauchsrelevanten
Produkten
This European Standard was approved by CEN on 13 February 2020.

CEN and CENELEC members are bound to comply with the CEN/CENELEC Internal Regulations which stipulate the conditions for
giving this European Standard the status of a national standard without any alteration. Up-to-date lists and bibliographical
references concerning such national standards may be obtained on application to the CEN-CENELEC Management Centre or to
any CEN and CENELEC member.
This European Standard exists in three official versions (English, French, German). A version in any other language made by
translation under the responsibility of a CEN and CENELEC member into its own language and notified to the CEN-CENELEC
Management Centre has the same status as the official versions.

CEN and CENELEC members are the national standards bodies and national electrotechnical committees of Austria, Belgium,
Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy,
Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Republic of North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia,
Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and United Kingdom.

CEN-CENELEC Management Centre:
Rue de la Science 23, B-1040 Brussels
© 2020 CEN/CENELEC All rights of exploitation in any form and by any means Ref. No. EN 45557:2020 E
reserved worldwide for CEN national Members and for
CENELEC Members.
Contents Page
European foreword . 3
Introduction . 4
1 Scope . 5
2 Normative references . 5
3 Terms and definitions . 5
3.1 Definitions . 5
3.1.1 Definitions related to materials . 5
3.1.2 Other definitions . 6
3.2 Abbreviations . 6
4 General assessment procedure. 7
5 Description of material composition of ErPs . 7
5.1 Scope of the assessment . 7
5.2 Material declaration clustering and unspecified materials . 8
5.3 Distinction between pre-consumer material and post-consumer material . 8
5.3.1 General. 8
5.3.2 Pre-consumer material . 8
5.3.3 Post-consumer material . 10
6 Traceability . 12
7 Calculation of recycled materials content . 12
7.1 General considerations . 12
7.2 Verification and mass balance process for parts or ErPs . 12
7.3 General method for recycled materials content calculation for parts or ErPs . 14
8 Reporting recycled materials content aspects . 15
8.1 General. 15
8.2 Elements of the assessment report . 15
Annex A (normative) Additional guidance for materials . 16
Annex B (informative) Example for the calculation of recycled materials content in an ErP . 22
Bibliography . 24

European foreword
This document (EN 45557:2020) has been prepared by Technical Committee CEN/CLC/JTC 10 “Energy-
related products – Material Efficiency Aspects for Ecodesign”, the secretariat of which is held by NEN.
This European Standard shall be given the status of a national standard, either by publication of an
identical text or by endorsement, at the latest by October 2020, and conflicting national standards shall
be withdrawn at the latest by October 2020.
Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of
patent rights. CEN shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights.
This document has been prepared under a mandate given to CEN by the European Commission and the
European Free Trade Association, and supports essential requirements of EU Directive(s).
The dual logo CEN-CENELEC standardization deliverables, in the numerical range of 45550 to 45559,
have been developed under standardization request M/543 of the European Commission and are
intended to potentially apply to any product within the scope of the Directive 2009/125/EC concerning
energy-related products (ErP).
Topics covered in the above standardization request are linked to the following material efficiency
aspects:
a) Extending product lifetime;
b) Ability to re-use components or recycle materials from products at end-of-life;
c) Use of re-used components and/or recycled materials in products.
These standards are general in nature and describe or define fundamental principles, concepts,
terminology or technical characteristics. They can be cited together with other product-specific, or
product-group, standards, e.g. developed by product technical committees.
This document is intended to be used by technical committees when producing horizontal, generic, and
product, or product-group, standards.
NOTE CEN/CENELEC/JTC 10 is a joint TC, and uses either CEN or CENELEC foreword templates, as
appropriate. The template for the current document is correct at the time of publication.
Attention is drawn to safety and other legislation relevant to ErP. Their purpose is to ensure that all
products intended for or likely to be used by consumers and other users under normal or reasonable
foreseeable conditions are safe.
According to the CEN-CENELEC Internal Regulations, the national standards organisations of the
following countries are bound to implement this European Standard: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria,
Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland,
Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Republic of
North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and the
United Kingdom.
Introduction
The recycled material content of a new product is a characteristic of the product and its parts, which
contributes to material efficiency, in addition to the potentials of reusability, recyclability and
recoverability.
With a focus on the efficient and effective use of natural resources, primary materials are often able to
be substituted by recycled materials, reducing the demand for primary materials, with related potential
environmental, social and economic implications. These could include reduced mining and consumption
of natural resources, reduced landfill, reduced emissions and energy savings. The overall environmental
impact will depend on the difference in the impacts of making materials from primary sources (oil, ore,
etc.) vs. reprocessing waste into secondary materials which would directly substitute primary
materials.
The benefit of increasing recycled materials content in products is, in many cases, the incentivisation of
recycling of end-of-life (EoL) waste material through the stimulation of demand for recycled materials.
In other cases, where there is already high demand for recycled materials compared to the available
supply, the link between specification of higher recycled materials content and the incentivisation of
recycling is weaker. In that case, specification of recycled materials content may not be relevant to eco-
design. The rationale for specifying recycled materials content, therefore needs to be considered for
each material individually depending on the specific supply/demand situation.
This document facilitates the provision of substantiated claims of the recycled materials content of
energy-related products (ErPs). Key for substantiated claims for new products is the recognition of the
chain of custody (CoC), which allows the tracing of recycled materials from different sources.
1 Scope
This document specifies a general method for assessing the proportion of recycled material in an
energy-related product. This document is applicable as the framework to be used for defining the
assessment of recycled materials content in specific product groups.
It is not intended to generate publicly available product information and compare products in the
absence of a product standard based on this document.
This document does not cover aspects such as quality and physical properties of recycled materials.
This document does not apply to the assessment of reused components.
NOTE EN 45556:2019 provides a general method for assessing the proportion of reused components in ErPs.
2 Normative references
The following documents are referred to in the text in such a way that some or all of their content
constitutes requirements of this document. For dated references, only the edition cited applies. For
undated references, the latest edition of the referenced document (including any amendments) applies.
EN 45559, Methods for providing information relating to material efficiency aspects of energy-related
products
3 Terms and definitions
3.1 Definitions
For the purposes of this document, the following terms and definitions apply.
ISO and IEC maintain terminological databases for use in standardization at the following addresses:
— ISO Online browsing platform: available at http://www.iso.org/obp
— IEC Electropedia: available at http://www.electropedia.org/
NOTE See CLC/TR 45550:- for additional definitions related to material efficiency of ErP.
3.1.1 Definitions related to materials
3.1.1.1
primary material
material made from virgin raw material(s)
3.1.1.2
recycled material
material which is either pre-consumer material or post-consumer material
Note 1 to entry: The terms “recycled material” and “secondary material” have the same meaning in this
document.
Under preparation. Stage at time of publication: CLC/prTR 45550:201X.
3.1.1.3
pre-consumer material
material diverted from the waste generated during a manufacturing process excluding reutilization of
materials such as rework, regrind or scrap generated in a process and being reincorporated in the same
process that generated it
Note 1 to entry: Same process means the same manufacturing operation for the same type of product in the
same or different physical location.
[SOURCE: ISO 14021:2016, 7.8.1.1, modified by replacement of “stream” by “generated”, addition of
Note 1 to entry and amended according to drafting rules of CEN/CLC Internal Regulations Part 3]
3.1.1.4
post-consumer material
material recovered from waste generated by households or by commercial, industrial and institutional
facilities in their role as end-users of a finished product
Note 1 to entry: This includes returns of products, or parts thereof, from the distribution of finished products for
end-users.
3.1.2 Other definitions
3.1.2.1
chain of custody
chain of responsibilities for, or control of, products or materials as they move through each step in the
relevant supply chain
3.1.2.2
part
hardware, firmware or software constituent of a product
Note 1 to entry: Firmware and software are not relevant for the purpose of this document.
[SOURCE: EN 45554:2020 definition 3.2]
3.1.2.3
waste
substance or object of any kind, which the holder discards or intends or is required to discard
[SOURCE: Directive 2008/98/EC]
3.2 Abbreviations
The following abbreviations have been used in this document:
CoC chain of custody
EoL end-of-life
ErP energy-related product
4 General assessment procedure
Primary materials and recycled materials are often physically or chemically indistinguishable, and there
are currently no reliable, accurate and reproducible methods available for directly measuring the
recycled materials content in a product. For the purpose of this document, the verification of recycled
materials content therefore relies on documented proof for traceability (see Clause 6) provided by the
relevant operator in the CoC. Recycled materials content is expressed as the average ratio of recycled
materials used to the total production output of energy-related products over a specific period of time.
The assessment of recycled materials content requires:
1) description of the scope of the assessment (see 5.1);
2) description of materials composition of a single product (see 5.2 and 5.3);
3) a management system to trace the type of material inputs, for both primary and recycled materials
(see Clause 6);
4) performance of a mass balance calculation, linking recycled materials content of parts/products to
total materials in parts/products produced (see Clause 7).
While Clause 7 elaborates on how to determine the recycled materials content of an ErP or its parts,
Annex A elaborates on how to determine the recycled materials content of a material, as manufacturers
can sometimes be ErP manufacturers, part manufacturers and/or material manufacturers. It is advised
to refer to the respective part of this document.
In Annex A material manufacturers are the main audience addressed.
5 Description of material composition of ErPs
5.1 Scope of the assessment
The users of this document shall define the scope of the assessment and select its appropriate elements
as detailed below. The assessment shall be applied either to
— the ErP, or
— parts of the ErP.
It is possible to perform the assessment of the ErP or parts at different levels for
— all materials, or
— a type of material, e.g. plastic, metal, glass (more details provided in 5.2), or
— individual material, e.g. polypropylene, aluminium, float glass (more details provided in 5.2).
The elements of the scope that are applicable shall be determined by the users of this document and
shall be documented (see 8.2).
The scope of the assessment shall define whether the recycled materials content assessment is done on
the pre-consumer material or the post-consumer material or both.
5.2 Material declaration clustering and unspecified materials
The material declaration is a way to express the composition of the materials contained in a product or
part. To establish a material declaration, each part of the product shall be assessed for the mass of its
constituent materials, according to the scope of assessment (see 5.1). The masses of the respective
material fractions shall be summed up to obtain the material composition of the whole part/product.
In many cases a given material type can represent different grades of the same material that are not
identical but very similar and thus share the majority of physical and chemical properties.
EXAMPLE Steel or polypropylene (PP) are produced in different grades for specific applications. The Society
of Automotive Engineers lists among others different grades of nickel-chromium steels with varying proportion of
nickel and chromium, e.g. 31xx, 32xx, 33xx, 34xx. For polypropylene, the three main grades are homopolymer PP,
random copolymer PP, block copolymer PP.
Various grades of a material type shall be treated as one material to determine the proportion of
recycled materials content of a product. Alloys may require the allocation to a certain material. The
users of this document shall define the applicable material clusters for their respective product group.
It may be necessary to exclude parts from allocation to specific material clusters due to their small size,
complexity of their material composition or for other reasons, e.g. administrative or legal. To keep the
mass balance even, these unspecified parts/materials shall be classified as “other materials” and be
accounted for in the total mass of the product. These “other materials” shall be treated as primary
material. The users of this document may determine limits for materials classified as “other materials” if
applicable.
5.3 Distinction between pre-consumer material and post-consumer material
5.3.1 General
Only pre-consumer materials and post-consumer materials shall count towards recycled materials
content, in accordance with the definition provided in Clause 3, and in line with specific guidelines
provided in Annex A for different material types.
Recycled material content is typically brought into a production process to substitute some primary
material. The recycled material can be pre-consumer or post-consumer material. The point of
substitution is reached when the different properties of the input materials combine into an output
comprised of homogenous material of defined properties.
5.3.2 Pre-consumer material
A material, which is reclaimed and reutilized within the same process that generated it shall not count
towards pre-consumer material. A material which is not reclaimed and reutilized within the same
process that generated it, and which undergoes material preparation, shall count towards pre-
consumer material. This general concept is visualized in Figure 1.
Key
Potential mix of material
Pre-consumer material
Figure 1 — Concept of pre-consumer material
A material, which is recovered within the same process that generated it, as shown in Figure 1, shall not
count as pre-consumer material for recycled materials content. For detailed information on specific
types of materials see Annex A.
EXAMPLE For most materials the recycled material content is fixed in a process where the material is
transformed from a liquid to a solid state. In the case of steel making, the recycled material content is fixed after
melting and casting into a solid slab, bloom, billet or ingot. Scrap originating from the meltshop, such as solidified
steel from steelmaking vessels (skulls) or rejected castings, would be excluded from the calculation of pre-
consumer material, because they can be reclaimed within the same melting process that generated them. This is
regardless of the fact that the scrap may need to be further prepared in order to make it suitable for use in a
production process, such as cutting to size. In the case of plastic injection moulding, rejects from this process
which are reclaimed and reutilized within the same process would not be considered pre-consumer material.
It is also important to describe where process A ends. Being part of the same process A can include
continuous processes (i.e. material or product cannot be diverted to different processing steps until the
end of that process step). At the end of the process A, the output can no longer change its inherent
recycled materials content (i.e. it is frozen/fixed). Material recovered from further processing after
process A could be included as pre-consumer material, because it has to go back to process A.
5.3.3 Post-consumer material
Once products have reached the end of their life, materials obtained from collected waste and treated
waste shall be considered post-consumer materials (see Figure 2). Products may reach the end of their
life shortly after being traded commercially or having left the final manufacturing facility. This might
happen when products are damaged or cannot be sold from their distribution chain (e.g. a new version
of a product replaces the previous one which cannot be sold anymore). Materials can only be
considered post-consumer after they have become part of a finished product for the end-user and are
subsequently discarded.
NOTE In this document, the term “finished product for the end-user” is used to describe a fully assembled
product. The notion of a finished product is used to distinguish product manufacturers from material/part
manufacturers.
Key
Potential mix of materials
Post-consumer material
Figure 2 — Concept of post-consumer material
EXAMPLE Float glass used in the manufacture of a window is considered as post-consumer material if it has
been assembled in an insulation glass unit that had been scrapped. Prior to this moment, it will be considered as
pre-consumer material.
6 Traceability
A traceability system able to track recycled materials from the moment they are identified as recycled
materials to their final application shall be implemented. As a minimum, traceability information for the
recycled materials is needed to calculate the recycled materials content.
Primary and recycled materials are often physically or chemically indistinguishable, and there are
currently no reliable, accurate and reproducible methods available for directly measuring the recycled
materials content in a product. Therefore, the verification of recycled materials content is based
exclusively on documentation.
For the purposes of the assessment, information allowing traceability (CoC) of the recycled materials
content in an ErP shall be gathered, see Annex A.2. The type (pre- or post-consumer) and the quantity of
recycled material shall be documented.
The required level of detail will depend upon the type of material (e.g. glass, plastics, metal, etc.), see
Annex A.5. The type of data and level of detail for this information shall be defined by users of this
document.
7 Calculation of recycled materials content
7.1 General considerations
The ErP manufacturer shall verify and calculate the mass balance as described in 7.2. The calculation
will be limited to the scope of the assessment, see 5.1.
The ErP manufacturer shall collect information, based on the calculations described in Annex A on the
recycled materials content of the supplied materials.
For ErP manufacturers who are also material manufacturers, calculation of the recycled materials
content of materials shall be carried out according to Annex A.
7.2 Verification and mass balance process for parts or ErPs
Calculation and verification of the recycled materials content in parts (according to the scope of the
assessment) or an ErP consists of balancing the mass of production output over a certain period of time
(the accounting period), with the material inputs, corrected for changes in material stock and
conversions during processes:
Output = Input − Change in stock − Internal conversions − Waste (1)
where
Output is the mass of material in parts or the ErP in the accounting period;
Input is the mass of materials/parts coming to the production in the accounting
period;
Change in stock is the change in stock of material in materials/parts in the accounting period;
Internal are the losses in material flows due to production technology (e.g.:
conversions polycondensation) in the accounting period;
Waste is the mass of wasted materials/parts from the production in the accounting
period.
Where a process has more than one input, the inputs ar
...