The European Directive on Construction Products (CPD) establishes a set of essential requirements on construction products to be fulfilled throughout the "working life" of the construction works. The demands expressed in the directive is one significant driver, international attention another. Both CEN through a "task force on durability" and ISO through TC59/SC14 "Design Life" are addressing the subject. The work of ISO has led to the establishment of a suite of procedural standards on service life planning, including service life declaration and service life assessment methodologies, useful to be applied in the declaration and the application of service life information.

The political agendas related to sustainable development and the understanding that building and construction is a key industrial sector to implement sustainability principles have led to the establishment of ISO TC59/SC17 "Sustainability in building construction". Being the first ISO subcommittee expressly dealing with sustainability in relation to an industrial sector, the work focuses on economic, environmental and social aspects of sustainability relative to buildings and construction works.

Together with the established standards on service life and the concept of performance-based building, all the three provide a procedural reference point for the consideration of sustainability aspects. They all benefit when applied in common context, and can provide each other with necessary information. On a European scale this common context is elaborated with the work of CEN TC350. The status of development, key drivers and key success factors are elaborated in this paper.