Environmental Life Cycle Assessment

PSE 476/FB 576

Lecture 3: Basic Components of an LCA

Fall 2016

Richard A. Venditti
Forest Biomaterials
North Carolina State University
Raleigh, NC 27695-8005

Richard_Venditti@[Link]
[Link]/venditti

1
 What is a Life Cycle Assessment ?
Life Cycle consecutive and interlinked stages of a product system,
from the raw material acquisition or generation from natural
resources to final disposal [ISO 14044:2006E].

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) compilation and evaluation of the

inputs, outputs and the potential environmental impacts of a product
system throughout its life cycle [ISO 14044:2006E].

Types of LCA
•Cradle to Grave: Considers everything from harvesting
materials to the disposal of the finished goods
•Cradle to Gate: raw materials to finished good (no use or end
life considerations)
•Gate to gate: taking products and raw materials from the
entrance gate of a manufacturing plant to the finished product
leaving the shipping gate (only onsite emmissions)
2
•Other…
 Life Cycle Stages
Recycled Materials

Energy Energy
Energy Energy Energy

Raw
Materials
Production Transportation Use Disposal
Recycle

Waste Waste Waste

Waste
Waste
Emissions to Emissions to
air and water Emissions to Emissions to
air and water air and water air and water

3
 Major Parts of a Life Cycle
Assessment
Goal and Scope
Definition

Inventory Analysis Interpretation

Impact Assessment

4
 Defining Goals
• Should state the intent of the study
– Intended application
– Intended use
– Intended audience
• Should also include reason for the
study

5
 Defining Scope
• Define functional unit of a product
• Establish system boundaries for the LCA
– What stages and operations are included?
• Determine data collection methods
– Literature
– Measurements
– Interviews
– Other…

6
 Functional Unit
• Definition: Quantified performance of a product
system for use as a reference unit (ISO 14044:
2006E)
• The service delivered that serves as a reference
quantity for the study
• Define a functional unit of product
– Example: 100 disposable paper cups vs 1 glass container washed 99
times
– The functional unit is ____________________________________

• The basis for comparison

7
 Functional Unit
• Brainstorm: functional unit for lipstick?

8 Time, gloss, color, opacity,

 Major Parts of a Life Cycle
Assessment
Goal and Scope
Definition

Inventory Analysis Interpretation

Impact Assessment

9
 Life Cycle Inventory Analysis(LCI):
• Definition: Phase of the life cycle assessment involving the compilation and the
quantification of inputs and outputs for a product throughout its life cycle [ISO
14044:2006(E)]
• Definition of the process
• Definition of all mass and energy inputs to the process
• Defining all flows from the “technosphere” into and out of the surrounding
environment, called elementary flows

10
 Life Cycle Inventory (LCI):
• Elementary flows: material or
energy entering the system being
studied that has been drawn from the
environment without previous human
transformation, or material or energy
leaving the system being studied that
is released into the environment
without subsequent human
transformation. [ISO 14044:2006E].

Tillman, Environmental Impact Assessment Review

20 (2000) 113–123

11
• Elementary flows: which of the following are elementary flows?

• A tree in a natural forest to be harvested

• A log that has been de-limbed and bucked
• Cotton boll in a farmer’s field ready to be harvested
• A bale of cotton on a truck
• Oil being put into a car
• Wastewater to the city treatment plant
• Treated waste water from a textiles factory discharged to the river
• Heat radiating off a large chemical reactor
• Gasses coming out of a stack from a wood drying kiln
• Steam from a power boiler stack
• Gasses like CO2 from a power boiler stack
• Garbage thrown on the roadside
• Garbage sent to a landfill
• Fugitive gasses like methane leaving the landfill
• Gas being delivered to a gas station
• Crude oil from the ground

12
13
14
15
 Important Aspects of Life Cycle
Assessment

Goal and Scope

Definition

Inventory Analysis Interpretation

Impact Assessment

16
 Impact Assessment
Definition:

Phase of life cycle assessment aimed at understanding and evaluating the

magnitude and significance of the potential environmental impacts for a
product system throughout its life cycle of the product [ISO
14044:2006E].

17
 Impact Assessment: ISO Standard

• Overall steps for LCA are defined in ISO 14044

• Defined as: a compilation and evaluation of the inputs and outputs and the
potential environmental impacts of a product system through its life cycle.
• Protocol for an impact assessment is explained in ISO 14042
• Mandatory elements for an impact assessment
– Selection of impact categories
– Assignment of inventory analysis results to impact categories
(classification)
– Calculation of impact category indicator results (characterization)
• Optional elements
– Calculation of the magnitude of category indicators (normalization), to
show the significance of the calculated impact category result to the
overall environmental problem
– Grouping and ranking of the impact categories
– Weighting of the impact categories (may not be used if competing
products are compared and presented to public)

18
 Impact Assessment: ISO Standard
• Some assessments use midpoints, other use endpoints.

• LCI Results: flows of mass or energy Most certain

• Midpoints: examples: radiation, smog, ozone layer…. Less certain
• Endpoints: Human health, ecosystems, resources Even less certain

• Interpretation Least certain

19
 Impact Assessment:
Choice of Impact Categories

• TRACI, The Tool for the Reduction and

Assessment of Chemical and Other
Environmental Impacts
•Global Warming
•Acidification
•Human health: Carcinogenics
•Human Health: Non carcinogenics
•Respiratory Effects
•Eutrophication
•Ozone Depletion
•Ecotoxicity
•Smog
 Impact Assessment: Classification
From LCI:

Carbon dioxide GHG Effect

Chlorofluorocarbons
Ground Level
Methane Ozone

NOx
Acid Rain
VOC

Pollutants Environmental
Effects

• Classification sorts pollutants according to the effects they have on the environment
 Impact Assessment: Characterization
Characterization factor: factor derived from a characterization model which is applied to
convert an assigned life cycle inventory analysis result to category indicators and to category
endpoints [ISO 14044:2006E]

Multiplication factor
1kg 1kg CO2 eq
Carbon dioxide X1 GHG Effect
(units of kg of
1kg 21 kg CO2 eq CO2 eq)
Methane X 21

Not all pollutants are created equally

Reference: [Link]
 Impact Assessment: ISO Standard

Example
– Impact Categories: smog formation, global warming, forest
depletion
– Inventory results: particulates, SO2., trees consumed
– Classification:
• Particulates to smog
• SO2 to smog and global warming
• Trees consumed to forest depletion and to global warming
– Characterization: Calculations of category results, eg, 10 mg of
particulates causes 20 units of smog and 10 mg of SO2 causes
5 units of smog, so a LCI with 5 mg of particulate and 10 mg of
SO2 produces 15 units of smog as the impact category result

23
 Impact Assessment:
GHG: Kg CO2eq/tonne product Climate Change as an Example: Hot Spot Identification

Manufacturing Landfill/Incineration

24
 Impact Assessment
Impact categories: Hot Spot Identification
 Normalization
Normalization: shows the relative significance of the calculated impact
category result to the overall environmental problem of that impact category

Helps answer the question: What percentage of GHG emissions does this
product contribute relative to all the GHG emissions from a certain
country/state/person/globe?

The category impact results for a certain product or service is divided by a

nomalization reference.

Needs more fleshing out. See page 105 Environmental Assessment of

Products, Wenzel et. al.

26 Time, gloss, color, opacity,

Impact Assessment: Normalization

Normalization: shows the relative significance of

the calculated impact category result to the
overall environmental problem of that impact
category
 Class Activity
Your Aunt Mabel has been living in the same house for the last 40 years in an older
neighborhood backed up to a large undeveloped wooded land mass with several
significant creeks and a river, about 20 square miles. For each of the items, respond with
a 1-10 rating, 1 representing the mildest dislike of the scenario and 10 representing the
strongest dislike of a scenario.

________ A company wants to establish a golf course on the property on about 1/5th of
the land. Pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers applied to the golf course are expected to
somewhat effect birds, squirrels and fish. Also effected will be many of the plants
surrounding the course as well as the water in the creeks and rivers

________ A company wants to harvest unique, uncommon, stray rocks that lie on the
ground that are valuable for interior home decoration. These rocks were formed over long
periods of time and will not be replaced.

________ A very small part of the land mass is sold to a company that will put a factory
very close to the neighborhood and emit low, below permissible levels of lead in a smoke
stack

28 Time, gloss, color, opacity,

 Impact Assessment: Weighting
• Weighting relates the relative importance of impact categories
• Eco-Indicator 99
– Questionnaire sent to 365 Swiss LCA interest groups
– Panel members ranked and weighted three damage categories
• SUBJECTIVE

Impact Category Mean Rounded St. Deviation Median

Human Health 36% 40% 19% 33%
Ecosystem Quality 43% 40% 20% 33%
Resources 21% 20% 14% 23%

[Mettier 1999] Mettier T.: Der Vergleich von

Schutzguetern - Ausgewaehlte Resultate einer
Panel-Befragung. In: Hofstetter P., Mettier T.,
Tietje O. (eds.), Ansaetze zum Vergleich von
Umweltschaeden, Nachbearbeitung des 9.
Diskussionsforums Oekobilanzen vom 4.
Dezember 1998, ETH Zürich, Switzerland, 1999

Red dot represents the average weights used for

Eco-Indicator 99
Impact Assessment
Weighting
Impact Assessment
Single score
 Important Aspects of Life Cycle
Assessment

Goal and Scope

Definition

Inventory Analysis Interpretation

Impact Assessment

32
 Life cycle interpretation:
• Definition: Phase of life cycle assessment in which
the findings of either the inventory analysis or the
impact assessment, or both, are evaluated in relation
to the defined goal and scope in order to reach
conclusions and recommendations [ISO 14044:2006E]

33
 Interpretation: ISO Standard
• Overall steps for LCA are defined in ISO 14044
• Proper protocol for interpretation is explained in ISO 14043

• 1. Should identify the significant issues based on the

inventory and assessment phases of the LCA
• 2. The interpretation should conduct these checks
– Completeness check
• Is relevant data present?
– Sensitivity check
• How sensitive are the LCA results to an assumption? To test: make a
change to the assumption and recalculate the LCA results.
– Consistency check
• Did the LCA abide by the stated goals and scope
• 3. Include conclusions, limitations and recommendations

34
 Summary
• Life cycle
• Life cycle assessment
• Life cycle inventory analysis
• Elementary flows
• US LCI
• Life cycle impact assessment
• Classification
• Characterization factor
• TRACI
• Normalization
• Weighting
• Single Score
• Life cycle interpretation

35