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Life-Cycle Based Sustainability Assessment of Products

Life-Cycle Based Sustainability Assessment of Products. Walter Klöpffer LCA Consult & Review Frankfurt am Main. LCA. LCA = Environmental Life Cycle Assessment Full sustainability assessment needs at least two further dimensions 1st SETAC Europe LCA Symposium, Leiden, December 1991.

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Life-Cycle Based Sustainability Assessment of Products

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  1. Life-Cycle Based Sustainability Assessment of Products Walter Klöpffer LCA Consult & Review Frankfurt am Main

  2. LCA • LCA = Environmental Life Cycle Assessment • Full sustainability assessment needs at least two further dimensions • 1st SETAC Europe LCA Symposium, Leiden, December 1991

  3. Hans-Carl von Carlowitz (1713)

  4. Brundtland Report • Brundtland, G.: Our Common Future. Oxford University Press. Oxford 1987: • "Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs"

  5. United Nations • United Nations Conference of Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro, 1992 • Sustainability identified as the guidingprinciple for the 21th Century • Reconfirmed in Johannesburg, 2002

  6. Sustainability Assessment of Products, Quantification SustAss = LCA + LCC + SLCA • LCA: Environmental Life Cycle Assessment • LCC: LCA-type Life Cycle Costing • SLCA: Societal Life Cycle Assessment

  7. Social or Societal LCA? • Societal refers to microeconomics • Social refers to macroeconomics • Thus “Societal” is more appropriate to the assessment of products, in order to distinguish the method from broader concepts (Hunkeler 2006)

  8. Prerequisites • Equal and consistent system boundaries for the three life-cycle methods, including • Physical instead of marketing life cycle in LCC • Identical or compatible LCIs (SLCA will be more demanding with regard to regional resolution)?

  9. Why Life-cycle based? • Systems approach needed in order to • Recognize and avoid trade-offs • No shifting of problems into the future!* • Life cycle thinking is a good starting point, but not enough for decisions • Quantitative methods are needed • Global system boundaries *especially important for sustainability, aspect of inter-generation fairness!

  10. Status of LCA • Standardized method: • SETAC “Code of conduct” 1993 • ISO 14040-14043 (1996-2000) • ISO/FDIS 14040+14044 (2006) will supersede (soon) 14040-14043 • Research and testing needed for difficult impact categories, I/O, regionalization, consequential LCA etc.

  11. Status of LCC • SETAC working group 2003-2005 • Book under review for SETAC Press • LCC Draft guideline writing group started May 2006: • To be finished for final discussion at the next SETAC World Congress July 2008 in Sidney

  12. Status of SLCA • Although the idea is not new (Oekoinstitut 1987, O`Brian et al. 1996), a steep increase in relevant papers occurred only recently: • Presentations at the SETAC World Congress, Portland 2004 • Dreyer et al. 2005; Weidema 2005, 2006; Norris 2006; Labuschagne and Brent 2006; Hunkeler 2006

  13. One Assessment or three? Option 1: • SustAss = LCA + LCC + SLCA Main advantage: transparency, no meaningless “sustainability points” Clear attribution of advantages and disadvantages in comparative assessments, no compensation

  14. One Assessment or three? Option 2: • SustAss = “LCA new” (including LCC and SLCA as additional impacts in LCIA) Question: • is Option 2 compatible with ISO?

  15. ISO/FDIS 14040 (2006) • LCA addresses the environmental aspects and potential impacts...throughout a product´s life cycle from raw material acquisition through production, use, end-of-life treatment, recycling and final disposal (i.e. cradle-to-grave). • LCA typically does not address the economic or social aspects of a product, but the life cycle approach and methodologies described in this International Standard may be applied to these other aspects.

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