ALBERT

Description: Purpose In recent years, green building has become a social hotspot and raised much concern of academic. However, traditional researches of green building mostly focused on technology, while research on social and humanity demand on green residential districts is still scarce. To complement the gap of research and reality, this paper is intended to establish a quantitative evaluation method for social humanity needs of green residential districts based on social life cycle assessment (SLCA). Methods Based on the SLCA method, an evaluation indicator system for social and humanity demand of green residential districts was proposed, considering different stakeholders (real estate developers, construction enterprises, community residents, and decision makers). Additionally, the adopted evaluation indicator system was applied to a practical community in China as a case study by questionnaire surveys and the method of analytic hierarchy process. Results and discussion Case study results show that the residents prefer to pay more for a better living environment, and the real estate developers are willing to increase the investment moderately on the projects. Meanwhile, the local government likes to support the development of green residential districts, as well. Conclusions Analysis results are in line with the social demand for high-quality living environment of Chinese residents and the public concern about buildings’ comprehensive benefits.

Description: Purpose Social life cycle assessment (S-LCA) applications have been growing during the last years. Most of the scientific articles published so far have addressed the applicability of S-LCA, focusing on selecting suitable indicators, and only recently, the developments in the area of impact pathway are increasing. However, a critical analysis of how to set an S-LCA study, in particular the goal and scope and inventory phase, is missing. This article critically analyses the most important elements affecting the goal and scope and inventory phase of S-LCA, with a focus on the automotive sector, with the ultimate goal of developing a structured approach to guide practitioners in the critical application of S-LCA. Methods The literature review covers 67 publications from 2006 to 2015, including all the case studies published so far, to the best knowledge of the authors, in several sectors and the automotive one. The reviewed works have been structured along the key elements affecting the goal and scope and inventory phases of the S-LCA. Results and discussion The methodological and practical issues affecting S-LCA have been organized into a conceptual map, in which all the elements are sequentially placed. This sequence is an orderly procedure consisting of several nodes representing crucial points where a decision needs to be taken or a further reflection is necessary. The case studies of the automotive sector and the corporate-related documents have been used also for the discussion of the conceptual map nodes to identify which aspects are already covered by the literature and which ones need further research. Conclusions Facing the inventory phase of S-LCA needs also to set specific elements of the goal and scope phase which are fundamental for approaching coherently the product system at hand and for supporting the selection of stakeholders, indicators, and data. Moreover, in order to foster S-LCA applications and make it a robust decision-support tool, the authors suggest to re-define its framework and approach according to the organizational perspective, as laid down in the recent Organisation Environmental Footprint and Organizational LCA. This implies that social aspects will be evaluated both in relation to the organization behavior and to the basket of products, thus reconciling the need to keep together the conduct-of-a-company perspective, typical of social evaluations, and the product-oriented approach, inherent to the life cycle and in particular to the functional unit concept.

Description: Purpose Initiatives like the EU Product Environmental Footprint have been pushing the discussion about the choice of life cycle impact assessment methods. Practitioners often prefer to use established methods for performance tracking, result stability, and consistency reasons. Method developers rather support newly developed methods. As case studies must provide consistent results in order to ensure reliable decision-making support, a systematic approach to qualify decision support maturity of newly developed impact assessment methods is needed. Methods A three step approach referring to key aspects for decision maturity was developed which takes the established life cycle impact assessment methods as a benchmark. In the first step, the underlying models of the methods and their respective differences are analyzed to capture the scope and detail of the characterization models. Second, the considered and available elementary flows covered by the methods are identified and compared to reveal consistent coverage, respectively, gaps between alternatives. In the third step, neglected elementary flows are evaluated with regard to their potential impact to the particular impact category. Furthermore, the characterization factors of concurring elementary flows are analyzed for significant differences in their shares. The developed approach was tested for LCIA methods for eutrophication and acidification in Europe. Results and discussion A systematic and practical qualification of decision support maturity can be achieved by a three-step approach benchmarking model scope, quantitative and qualitative coverage of elementary flows for new methods with established ones. For the application example, the established CML-IA method was compared with the ReCiPe method and the method of accumulated exceedance. These models vary regarding subdivision of environmental compartments, consideration of fate, as well as regionalization of characterization factors. The amount of covered elementary flows varies significantly as CML-IA covers about 28 more flows within the category acidification and about 35 more flows within the category eutrophication compared to ReCiPe and accumulated exceedance. The significance of all neglected elementary flows for the categories eutrophication and acidification is significant and represents a gap of up to 80 %. Furthermore, it was shown that the shares of some concurring elementary flows differ significantly. Conclusions The introduced approach allows the benchmarking of newly developed against established methods based on application-oriented criteria. It was demonstrated that significant differences between the methods exist. To guarantee reliable decision-making support, newly developed methods should not replace established ones until a minimum level of decision support maturity is reached.

Description: Purpose Several new “biophysical” co-product allocation methodologies have been developed for LCA studies of agricultural systems based on proposed physical or causal relationships between inputs and outputs (i.e. co-products). These methodologies are thus meant to be preferable to established allocation methodologies such as economic allocation under the ISO 14044 standard. The aim here was to examine whether these methodologies really represent underlying physical relationships between the material and energy flows and the co-products in such systems, and hence are of value. Methods Two key components of agricultural LCAs which involve co-product allocation were used to provide examples of the methodological challenges which arise from adopting biophysical allocation in agricultural LCA: (1) the crop production chain and (2) the multiple co-products produced by animals. The actual “causal” relationships in these two systems were illustrated, the energy flows within them detailed, and the existing biophysical allocation methods, as found in literature, were critically evaluated in the context of such relationships. Results and discussion The premise of many biophysical allocation methodologies has been to define relationships which describe how the energy input to agricultural systems is partitioned between co-products. However, we described why none of the functional outputs from animal or crop production can be considered independently from the rest on the basis of the inputs to the system. Using the example of manure in livestock systems, we also showed why biophysical allocation methodologies are still sensitive to whether a system output has economic value or not. This sensitivity is a longstanding criticism of economic allocation which is not resolved by adopting a biophysical approach. Conclusions The biophysical allocation methodologies for various aspects of agricultural systems proposed to date have not adequately explained how the physical parameters chosen in each case represent causal physical mechanisms in these systems. Allocation methodologies which are based on shared (but not causal) physical properties between co-products are not preferable to allocation based on non-physical properties within the ISO hierarchy on allocation methodologies and should not be presented as such.

Description: A bstract Purpose Electricity is one of the main contributors to global environmental impacts, and its role as an energy carrier is expected to grow substantially. Consequently, reliable and accurate inventories of material and energy flows associated with electricity supply are essential in environmental assessments. This article aims to summarize existing challenges and opportunities in the modeling of life cycle inventories (LCIs) of electricity supply from a data quality perspective. Methods We systematically review the state-of-the-art in LCI modeling of current and future electricity supply worldwide. The analysis is structured according to the data quality characteristics proposed in ISO 14044: 2006 : representativeness, completeness, consistency, reproducibility, uncertainty, data sources, and precision. Results and discussion Looking at existing LCIs through the lens of data quality, we observe difficulties in obtaining temporally and technologically representative data, while geographically representative data is still unavailable for some regions. Moreover, meta-analyses encountered issues of reproducibility combined with a lack of consistency across studies, impeding interstudy comparability. Additionally, some flows such as upstream fugitive emissions have been underestimated. The aforementioned issues have a negative impact on the quality of LCIs. Here, we provide recommendations on how several methods such as equilibrium models, regression, or parameterization can be used to improve data quality, underpinned by more powerful data formats. Open-source models, data platforms, as well as a list of key parameters to be reported are suggested to facilitate reproducibility and enhance transparency of electricity LCIs. Conclusions There are several methods and resources that can be used to improve LCIs of electricity supply, enabling more ambitious and powerful analyses. Nonetheless, special care should be taken concerning tradeoffs between different data quality aspects. For instance, more complex and accurate models may result in a loss of transparency and reproducibility unless additional reporting efforts are conducted. Other approaches, such as systematic parameterization do not compromise data quality and should be used to improve the consistency and reproducibility of inventories.

Description: Purpose Due to various environmental pressures such as climate change and scarcity of natural resources, as well as nontariff barriers from trade partners, Thailand has established the Thai national life cycle inventory (LCI) database in 2006. In the 1st phase (2006–2007), three working groups were developed for natural gas, refinery, and petrochemical products. Another seven working groups were established in the 2nd phase (2007–2010) for ferrous and non-ferrous metals, utilities and transportation, construction materials, agricultural materials and products, basic chemicals, recycling and waste management, and others. In the 3rd phase (2010 to present), expansion of the number of data sets from the previous phases has been carried out. The purpose of this paper is to present the experiences on national database development in emerging countries with the example of Thailand on both strategic and technical levels using refinery products as the case study. Methods Data sets were developed according to ISO 14044:2006. The LCI data were managed and archived at the central facility known as the “central LCI database”. The Life Cycle Assessment lab (LCA lab) at MTEC, NSTDA, has been responsible for the central LCI database management. From 2008 to 2010, the “Thai national LCI database and its applications” project was granted a 3-year funding of over 50 million THB, and was operated under supervision of a steering committee set up by the Ministry of Industry (MoI). For this case study, to illustrate the development process, primary data of the refinery products were collected by Petroleum Institute of Thailand in the year 2005 from seven refineries covering more than 70 % of the production in the country. Attributional modelling has been used, with energy content as an allocation criterion. Results and discussion During the initial phase of the “Thai National LCI Database Development Project”, two key barriers have been faced. One was the lack of awareness from stakeholders as LCI and LCA were quite new tools for most people in Thailand. This problem was tackled by collaborating with the right strategic partners to drive the LCI national project and educating stakeholders with the training supports from Japan. The other hindrance was the lack of expertise of local experts on LCA. It took several years to continually build the capacity through seminars and workshops in Thailand and Japan, including “on the job training” on some pilot projects. As of May 2016, there were more than 700 data sets in the Thai national LCI database, considering only the data that MTEC acted as the project commissioner. However, only 515 data were certified as the national database. The other 211 data were qualified merely as the data from pilot projects. More details of the database list and how to access the data can be viewed in Thai language at the URL: http://www.thailcidatabase.net . Because the Thai national LCI data were mostly primary data from a core set of products for the Thai economy with a very high representativeness (〉60 %) of the actual Thai productions, the data have been treated carefully. Only C-to-G data and G-to-G data from literature were allowed to disclose to Thai delegates with some signing agreements. However, G-to-G data from the actual Thai productions were sometimes provided, only with the signing confidentiality contracts. For refinery products, seven average data sets were established as national LCI data sets, i.e. liquefied petroleum gas, sulfur, gasoline, kerosene/jet oil, naphtha, fuel oil and diesel, with the year 2005 as the reference year. The data representativeness was very high covering more than 70 % of the production in Thailand. Due to the positive feedback and engagement from industries, several LCI projects have been started after this initial phase. The national LCI data sets have been used in various national applications and policies such as sustainable biofuels, government green public procurement, green GDP, Thai carbon footprint, etc. However, some relevant limitations of the Thai LCI database were listed as follows. Similar to most surveyed national LCI database worldwide, the climate change impact category has been chosen as the main focus for these data sets. Nevertheless, there is a more growing demand to use the data for other applications. As a result, more data sets that cover other impact categories will be required in the near future. Regarding the nomenclature and format, the Thai data sets were technically unique and not fully compatible with any other database. Conclusions The Thai national LCI database could be considered as the pioneer case for other countries in the South East Asia region. Thailand has further progressed in its LCI database development. Since 2009, the Thai national LCI database has been used as one of the key infrastructures of Thailand to support public policies and applications related to green growth. Many Thai stakeholders are well aware on LCI, LCA, and EcoDesign. Expertise of local experts has been increasingly improved. However, there are still more challenges to be faced to harvest the value of the Thai database in its full potential for better decision making in industry and policy, and for better positioning of Thai products on the global markets. From our experience, the following issues could be identified as “lessons learned”. At the onset of the project, it was crucial to get in expert advices from LCA-experienced countries to establish local expertise. Also, industry experts from abroad could help in clarifying the concept and addressing confidentiality concerns, as well as building awareness on LCA to Thai industries. Searching for some supporting programmes for capacity building, such as the GPP from Japan in our case, could provide great benefits to any emerging economies for national LCI initiatives. However, sustaining the trained human resources was also vital. Continual funding supports for LCI development and its applications were necessary to keep the momentum of active people in the field. Multiplying effect of the LCI knowledge to related organizations in the three main groups, i.e. government, academia, and industries, could help sustain the knowhow. Also, effective knowledge management through media such as books, guidelines, training courses, etc. would relief the turnover problem of trained staffs. Although it took a lot of time to develop local expertise, it was an essential step to have sufficient number of local experts to sustain the national database project. Moreover, a strong network of experts and researchers locally and internationally also strengthened the technical capacity to deal with any challenges during the project implementation. Furthermore, collaboration with the right strategic partners to drive the project was also very important in order to elevate it to the national level. It should be noted for any emerging economies aiming to initiate national LCI, the work plan for LCI database development (including the database management system) and its applications should be well balanced. Also, a well-designed database management system would enhance the database usage in the long run, especially when dealing with various impact categories like those in PEF.

Description: Purpose Life cycle assessment (LCA) studies of food products, such as dairy, require many input parameters that are affected by variability and uncertainty. Moreover, correlations may be present between input parameters, e.g. between feed intake and milk yield. The purpose of this study was to identify which input parameters are essential to assess the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of milk production, while accounting for correlations between input parameters, and using a systematic approach. Methods Three diets corresponding to three grazing systems (zero-, restricted and unrestricted grazing) were selected, which were defined to aim for a milk yield of 10,000 kg energy corrected milk (ECM) cow −1  year −1 . First, a local sensitivity analysis was used to identify which parameters influence GHG emissions most. Second, a global sensitivity analysis was used to identify which parameters are most important to the output variance. The global analysis included correlations between feed intake and milk yield and between N fertilizer rates and crop yields. The local and global sensitivity analyses were combined to determine which parameters are essential . Finally, we analysed the effect of changing the most important correlation coefficient (between feed intake and milk yield) on the output variance and global sensitivity analysis. Results and discussion The total GHG emissions for 1 kg ECM ranged from 1.08 to 1.12 kg CO 2 e, depending on the grazing system. The local sensitivity analysis identified milk yield, feed intake, and the CH 4 emission factor of enteric fermentation of the cows as most influential parameters in the LCA model. The global sensitivity analysis identified the CH 4 emission factor of enteric fermentation, milk yield, feed intake and the direct N 2 O emission factor of crop cultivation as most important parameters. For both grazing systems, N 2 O emission factor for grazing also turned out to be important. In addition, the correlation coefficient between feed intake and milk yield turned out to be important. The systematic approach resulted in more parameters than previously found. Conclusions By combining a local and a global sensitivity analysis, parameters were determined which are essential to assess GHG emissions of milk production. These parameters are the CH 4 emission factor of enteric fermentation, milk yield, feed intake, the direct N 2 O emission factor of crop cultivation and the N 2 O emission factor for grazing. Future research should focus on reducing uncertainty and improving data quality of these essential parameters.

Description: Purpose Improving technical properties and the durability of wood-based products by modification in various processing technologies is subject to recent research and development activities. This study aimed at integrating environmental considerations during the research and development phase of a novel modification process for a multilayer wood parquet. Due to expected challenges when applying Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) in this phase, the eco-profile of the modified multilayer wood parquet was referred to the original multilayer parquet by estimating payback period and identifying other payback options. Methods An LCA was conducted during the research and development phase of the modification process at laboratory scale and is characterized as ex ante environmental screening of a newly developed technology. The environmental assessment of new products and manufacturing processes during the research and development phase, however, faces multifarious challenges, such as the definition of a functional unit and the service life length. In order to overcome these challenges, the idea was to answer the question under which circumstances the modification process pays back from the perspective of non-renewable energy use and global-warming potential. Aside from investigation of payback period, the feasibility of other payback options was systematically searched. Results and discussion The extra resource input and the resulting increase in environmental burden of the modification of the multilayer parquet can be justified with the extension of service life length by 10 to 20 %, referring to global warming potential and non-renewable energy use, respectively. Other payback options found were adjusting chemical loading during modification, making renovations superfluous, or reducing transport effort. Other than transportation and renovation, which are user-dependent, only the modification lies within the scope of the parquet producer. Conclusions The payback concept is found suitable for comparative estimations on the magnitude of change in environmental performance of product variants during research and development. By investigating on multiple payback options, it was enabled to frame the change in environmental performance, which is essential in order to define the scope of further research and development in a target-oriented way. The possibility of using LCA for an environmental technology valuation at an early stage in product and process development is demonstrated in this study.

Description: Purpose The main purpose of this study is to present an implementation of the subcategory assessment method (SAM) to the life cycle of an Italian variety of tomato called “Cuore di Bue” produced by an Italian cooperative. The case study was used to use the methodology proposed in compliance with the guidelines of social life cycle assessment (S-LCA) in order to highlight issues for the improvement of SAM. A summary of strengths and weaknesses of the methodology as well as the social performance of the considered Italian tomato is an important result of this case study. Methods The methodology used is based on SAM. The UNEP/SETAC guidelines of S-LCA and the complementary methodological sheets were used as main references to carry out SAM, and it was used to assess the social performances of Cuore di Bue. The focus was on the assessment of the following three out of five stakeholder groups presented in the guidelines: workers, local community and consumers. Specific questionnaires have been developed to collect the inventory data related to each stakeholder group and along the product life cycle. Results and discussion SAM of Cuore di Bue showed a range of values, between 2 and 3 (C-B) for consumer stakeholder group and mainly 3 (B) for the local community and worker stakeholders. Because the best performance (A) is related to a numerical value of 4, better performances were not identified, owing to no propagation of actions in the value chain. The collective bargaining, transparency, feedback mechanism and privacy are the subcategories with the worst performance, but at the same time with more potential for improvements. Conclusions The implementation of SAM on Cuore di Bue allowed us to demonstrate how SAM transforms qualitative data into semi-quantitative information through a score scale that can help a decision maker achieve a product overview. SAM has been implemented on Cuore di Bue; the product assessment, the strengths and weaknesses of the methodology are identified and discussed as well. It has been possible to present the best and worst performances in product life cycle, by identifying the phase or the subcategories with good or bad performance. However, in this case study, as the same company owns most of the product life cycle taken into account, the majority of social performances are identical, and this may represent a limit of the methodology or that more organisations along the life cycle must be taken into account (for example, energy, distribution).