A quick look at Life Cycle Assessment
Picture of the life cycle stages that a product goes through
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a scientific method of calculating the environmental impacts of products over their life. This includes getting raw materials, such as metal ores and agricultural materials out of the ground; making basic products such as metals and plastic; manufacturing them into consumer goods; using them; and finally either throwing them into landfill or recycling them.
By looking at the whole life cycle, we dont make the mistake of making judgements based on only one part of a products life. For example, Nuclear energy, whilst having a low carbon impact during operation, has a large variety of impacts during both the mining and refinement stages of its life cycle, as well as during the decommissioning of the plant and treatment and storage of the nuclear waste.
LCA is defined by ISO 14040 as “Compilation and evaluation of the inputs and outputs and the potential environmental impacts of a product system throughout its life cycle”.
Life cycle assessments should be conducted by experts who have developed their skills over several years. In fact in order to get ISO certification on an LCA a peer review has to be completed which means all the data, assumptions and processes have to be checked by another LCA expert to make sure that the study is up to scratch.
Life Cycle Assessment’s show a complete picture of a product’s environmental impacts, it provides a systematic way of thinking that can help designers, product engineers & developers to differentiate the impacts of comparable materials, processes, products and services and allows them to consider and design around the broader environmental implications of the product & service. Without a life cycle perspective, assumptions about environmental impacts and benefits can result in the generation of un-sustainable products and risk accidental greenwashing.
LCA expert Tim Grant provides an introduction to life cycle assessment
More info…
European Union: General guide for Life Cycle Assessment
Eco Indicator 99 – life cycle impact assessment tool
Pre: Introduction to LCA with Simapro 7 (LCA software)
