life cycle thinking in sustainable design

IDSA – Digging Deeper, July 22 2008, San Francisco, CA

Life Cycle Thinking in Sustainable Design

Joep MeijerPresident of theRightenvironment

Chemical Engineer

10 year LCA Expert in EU

2 years in Austin


Life Cycle Thinking =

• No trade-offs in life cycles- It is not only design and construct, it is operations too

- Where does it come from and where does it end up

• No trade-offs in different aspects of Sustainability- One-issue thinking forgets other issues


Organic salad outside of CA

A bag of organic spring leaf lettuce, brings 57 calories of food to your table

How many calories of energy did they invest in cutting, washing, cooling and transportation to get you this fabulous bowl of lettuce?


Organic salad outside of CA

A bag of organic spring leaf lettuce, brings 57 calories of food to your table

How many calories of energy did they invest in cutting, washing, cooling and transportation to get you this fabulous bowl of lettuce?

About 70 times that much: 4500 calories


Life Cycle Thinking =

Making informed decisions

By everybody involved


A common language

If you need to have everybody involved, then

How can we make everybody communicate?

What language do we need to develop?


My language: Life cycle assessment (LCA)

LCA is a powerful tool for assessing the environmental performance of products, services or scenarios

It is based on material and energy flows for processes and materials that together form a life cycle

Resource A

Resource B

Production Assembly

Use

Maintenance

Recycling

Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Goal and Scope

What question do we want to answer?

What is the basis for comparison?

Who is the target audience?

Which life cycle phases are of interest?

Which impact categories are of interest?

Who are the stakeholders?Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Inventory

What data do we need to satisfy the goal and scope?

Who do we need to contact for information?

With what level of information are we satisfied?

Incoming and outgoing material and energy flows for every process and material

Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Impact Assessment

How do we translate 1 kWh of electricity to an environmental profile consisting of different environmental impact categories?

By using equivalency factors for different substances and adding them up to a total:

From carbon dioxide and methane to global warming

1 kg carbon dioxide = 1 kg GWP-equivalents1 kg methane = 24 kg GWP-equivalents------------------------------------------------------------------

Total = 25 kg GWP-equivalents

Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Impact categories

A range of impact categories can be distinguished• global warming• depletion of non-renewables• depletion of the ozone layer• acidification• eutrophication• summersmog• aquatic ecotoxicity• terrrestrial ecotoxicity• human toxicity• energy• non-hazardous waste• hazardous waste• …

Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Impact Assessment

The result is an Environmental profile

Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Interpretation

Major contributions give options for improvements

Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Interpretation

Major contributions in terms of substances per impact category

Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Interpretation

Normalization tells us which impact categories are relatively important compared to all emissions in a certain year for a certain area.

Introduction

Goal and Scope

Inventory

Impact Assessment

Interpretation


Uses

LCA can be used for any assessment of environmental performance:

• Carbon footprint calculators• Environmental product declarations• Design for the Environment• Policy and transition scenario studies• Prioritizing green purchasing and investments• Benchmark technologies and products• And more…


Your computer

a) 2/3 of US computers are left on every night and weekend

b) Over 350 hazardous materials/chemicals went into the manufacturing

c) Over 1000 hazardous materials/chemicals went into the manufacturing

d) Self aware computers already control 75% of the U.S. government


Sustainable Design =

First take care ofProducing natural capital

Enhancing social sustainability

Economy

will follow

It will be a different economy

Get ready for change


LCA for Design = ask yourself

How to include life cycle considerations into your daily practice?

- What environmental topics?- What life cycle phases?- At which stage of the design process?CO2 the

New Carb


What do I want to work on

• Better and more information for decision makers• Based on life cycle thinking• Involving responsible parties• Accepted framework• Verified/certified• Great tools


Feeling hungry?

a) A cow metabolized 15 lb of corn into muscle for a 1/4 lb burger

b) The growing of feed for beef cattle accounts for 10% of the world's pesticide use

c) A cheeseburger can take 700 gallons of water to make

d) I'm not sure that a cheeseburger even contains beef from a cow


Life Cycle Thinking in Sustainable Design

Joep MeijerPresident of theRightenvironment

www.theRightenvironment.net

life cycle thinking in sustainable design

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