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

Hans-Carl von Carlowitz (1713)

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"

United Nations

• United Nations Conference of Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro, 1992

• Sustainability identified as the guiding principle for the 21th Century

• Reconfirmed in Johannesburg, 2002

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

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)

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)?

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!

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.

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

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

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

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?

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.