System tools to support

Industrial Ecology
 Goals of Industrial Ecology

 The primary goal of industrial ecology is to

promote sustainable development at the
global, regional, and local levels

 Sustainable development has been defined as

“meeting the needs of the present
generation without sacrificing the needs of
future generations”
System Tools for Industrial Ecology

 Life Cycle Assessment/Analysis

 Environmental Impact Assessment

 Cleaner Production

 Environmental Management Systems

LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT
(LCA)
 Definition
 Life-cycle analysis (LCA) is a method in which the
energy and raw material consumption, different types of
emissions and other important factors related to a
specific product are being measured, analyzed and
summoned over the products entire life cycle from an
environmental point of view.

 Life cycle assessment (LCA), is a method of evaluating the

environmental consequences of a product or process
“from cradle to grave”

 U.S. EPA has stated that an LCA “is a tool to evaluate the
environmental consequences of a product or activity
holistically, across its entire life.
Processes involved in LCA
 Definition cont….

 LCA is a technique, which assists in assessing the

environmental aspects and potential impacts
associated with a product, by:
 Compiling an inventory of relevant inputs and outputs of a
product system.
 Evaluating the potential environmental impacts associated
with the selected inputs and outputs.
 Interpreting the results of the inventory analysis and impact
assessment phases in relation to the objectives of the study.
 The general categories of environmental impacts
needing consideration include resource use, human
health and ecological consequences.
 Definition cont….

 Therefore, one can conclude that LCA is the:

“Compilation and evaluation of the inputs,

outputs and the potential environmental
impacts of a product system throughout its life
cycle”

 A way of looking at the effect on the environment of

products (or processes) including packaging
 Considers the whole life cycle, from raw material
production to ultimate fate
 Why Conduct a Life Cycle Assessment?

 There are many reasons for your company to conduct a Life Cycle
Assessment. It can be used to:
 reduce environmental impact and waste,
 minimize the magnitude of pollution
 conserve non-renewable resources
 conserve ecological systems
 develop and utilize cleaner technologies
 maximize recycling of materials and waste
 reduce costs, focus product development,
 support marketing claims, apply the most appropriate pollution
prevention and/or abatement techniques
 improve product/corporate image and/or identify appropriate
performance indicators. Further, doing an LCA creates common
metrics that can be compared and shared across your company,
or with your suppliers and partners.
 Variants of a Life Cycle

 Cradle –to- Grave

 Cradle –to- Gate
 Cradle –to-Cradle
 Gate-to-Gate
 Wheel-to-Wheel
 Ecology-based
COMPONENTS/ PHASES OF AN LCA
 Methodology for LCA

Goal Definition and Scope:

 Select product or activity
 Define purpose of study (comparison? improvement?)
 Fix boundaries accordingly

 Thus, pay special attention to:

• What purpose the model is to serve,
• what one wishes to study,
• what depth and degree of accuracy are required, and
• what will ultimately become the decision criteria.
• In addition, the system boundaries - for both time and place -
should be determined.
 The scope of an LCA must consider and describe the
following items:
 The functions of the product system, or, in case of comparative
studies, the systems.
 The functional unit.
 The product system to be studied.
 Allocation procedures.
 Types of impact and methodology, impact assessment and
interpretation to be used.
 Data requirements.
 Assumptions.
 Limitations.
 Initial data quality requirements.
 Type of critical review.
 Type and format of the report required for the study.
 Function and Functional Unit
example:
Paper versus. plastic grocery sacks
Function is to carry groceries so the
Functional unit could be a defined volume of
groceries -- one plastic sack does not hold the same
volume of groceries as a paper sack

The functional unit determines equivalence between systems.

Choosing a functional unit is not always straightforward and can have a
profound impact on the results of the study. For example, if paper and
plastic grocery sacks are to be compared in an LCA, the functional unit
would be a given volume of groceries. Because fewer groceries, in general,
are placed in plastic sacks than in paper sacks, the sacks would not be
compared on a 1 to 1 basis. Instead, two plastic sacks
might be determined as having the equivalent function of one paper sack.
 Methodology for LCA cont..
Inventory Analysis:
 Determine the emissions that occur and the raw materials and
energy that are used during the life-cycle of a product. This means
that the inputs and outputs of all life-cycle processes have to be
determined in terms of material and energy.

 Start with making a process tree or a flow-chart classifying the

events in a product’s life-cycle which are to be considered in the
LCA, plus their interrelations.

 Next, start collecting the relevant data for each event: the
emissions from each process and the resources (back to raw
materials) used.

 Establish (correct) material and energy balance(s) for each

process stage and event.
THE PRODUCT LIFE CYCLE SYSTEM
PROCESS FLOW DIAGRAM
 Methodology for LCA cont….
The following diagram contains inputs and outputs to be quantified in a single stage
or unit operation
Process Materials, Reagents,
Solvents & Catalysts (including
reuse & recycle from another stage)
Energy

Product Material
Inputs (including
reuse & recycle from Reuse/Recycle
another stage) Single Stage or Unit
Operation
Primary Product

Useful Co-product
Fugitive &
Untreated
Waste Waste
Reuse/Recycle
 Methodology for LCA cont….
Impact Assessment:
 Assess what the impacts of these emissions and raw material
depletions are.
 The impact assessment stage seeks to determine the severity of the
impacts and rank them.
 Selection and definition of impact categories (e.g. global warming, acidification
etc.)

 Classification: assigning LCI results to the impact categories (e.g. classifying CO2
to global warming)

 Characterization: modeling LCI results within the impact categories using

science based conversion factors (e.g. modeling the potential impacts of CO2 and
methane to global warming)

 Normalization: expressing the potential impacts in ways that can be compared

(e.g. comparing the global warming impact of CO2 and methane for the two
options)
 Methodology for LCA cont….

 Grouping: sorting or ranking the indicators (e.g. sorting the

indicators by location: local, regional and global)

 Weighting: emphasizing the most important potential impact.

 Evaluate and Report: gaining a better understanding of the

reliability of LCIA results.

 In the classification stage, impacts are placed in one of

four categories:
 resource depletion,
 ecological health,
 human health, and
 social welfare.
 Examples of Common Impact Categories
 Greenhouse gas emissions  Land use

 Air emissions  Ecotoxicity

 Carcinogens  Aquatic
 Non-carcinogens  Terrestrial
 Respiratory in-organics

 Ozone layer depletion

 Aquatic  Ionizing radiation
 Acidification
 Eutrophication
 Non-renewable energy
 Mineral extraction
 Health impacts
Material/impact Environmental effect
depletion of biotic resources
copper
depletion of abiotic resources
CO2
greenhouse effect
CFC
SO2 ozone layer depletion

NOx acidification

phosphorous Eutrophication
volatile organic (summer) smog
compounds
(VOCs) human toxicity
heavy metals eco-toxicity
PCB
odour
pesticides
styrene
Smog - A form of air pollution produced by
the photochemical reaction of sunlight with
hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides that have
been released into the atmosphere, especially
by automotive emissions.
 Methodology for LCA cont….

Improvement Analysis:
 The final step in Life-Cycle Analysis is to identify areas for
improvement. Interpret the results of the impact assessment
in order to suggest improvements.
 The improvement analysis, should respond to the results of
the inventory and/or impact assessment by designing
strategies to reduce the identified environmental impacts.
 Consult the original goal definition for the purpose of the analysis and the target
group.
 Life-cycle areas/processes/events with large impacts (i.e., high numerical values)
are clearly the most obvious candidates
 However, what are the resources required and risk involved?
 Good areas of improvement are those where large improvements can be made
with minimal (corporate) resource expenditure and low risk.
 Methodology for LCA cont….

Example of LCA application

 One case study on hard surface cleaners revealed
that heating water for use with the product
resulted in a significant percentage of total energy
use and air emissions related to cleaning.
 Based on this information, opportunities for
reducing impacts were identified, such as designing
cold-water and no-rinse formulas and educating
consumers to use cold water.
 Benefits of LCA

 The performance of an LCA can assist in:

 The identification of improvement opportunities for the
studied product’s environmental aspects throughout its
whole life.
 Decision-making in industry, governmental and non-
governmental organizations (e.g. strategy planning,
priority setting, etc.).
 The selection of relevant environmental performance
indicators and adequate measurement techniques.
 Marketing opportunities for “greener” products (e.g. eco
labeling, environmental product declaration, etc.).
 APPLICATIONS OF LCA

 Life cycle assessments can be used both internally

(within an organization) and externally (by the public
and private sectors).
 Internally, LCAs can be used to establish a
comprehensive baseline that product design teams
should meet, identify the major impacts of a product’s
life cycle, and guide the improvement of new product
systems toward a net reduction of resource requirements
and emissions in the industrial system as a whole.
 Externally, LCAs can be used to compare the
environmental profiles of alternative products, processes,
materials, or activities and to support marketing claims.
LCA can also support public policy and eco-labeling
programs.
 APPLICATIONS OF LCA cont…

LCAs are used:

 In the design process to determine which of several designs
may leave a smaller “footprint on the environment”, or
 After the fact to identify environmentally preferred
products in government procurement or eco-labeling
programs.

 Also, the study of reference or benchmark LCAs provides

insight into the main causes of the environmental impact of
a certain kind of product and design priorities and product
design guidelines can be established based on the LCA data.

 You have to do one LCA for every product in your company

 Recognized Problems with LCA

 Goal Definition and Scoping

 Costs and time to conduct an LCA may be prohibitive to small firms.
 Temporal & spatial dimensions are difficult to address.
 Definition of functional units can be problematic.
 Complex products (automobiles) require tremendous resources to analyze.
 You have to do one LCA for every product in your company

 Data Collection
 Data availability and access can be limiting.
 Data quality concerns such as bias, accuracy, precision, and completeness
are often not well-addressed.
 Data Evaluation
 Sophisticated models and model parameters may not be available,

 Information Transfer
 Design decision-makers often lack knowledge about environmental effects.
 Aggregation and simplification techniques may distort results.
 Impact categorization is difficult (global warming, Eutrophication, etc.)
 Recognized Problems with LCA

 The major disadvantage of quantitative LCAs is their

complexity and effort required.
 Designers and manufacturing engineers find it almost
impossible to practically work with LCAs because of
 the consistent lack of solid data about all aspects of a products life
cycle,
 the nearly infinite amount of decisions to make and data to deal with,
 the lack of standardization resulting in numerous conversions and
interpretations,
 the lack of a standard evaluation scheme caused by and resulting in
different views on what is environmentally correct,
 the approach is currently only suitable for design analysis /
evaluation rather than design synthesis. LCAs are "static" and only
deal with a snapshot of material and energy inputs and outputs in a
dynamic system.
 Closing Remarks

 It is not the product, but the life-cycle of the product that

determines its environmental impact.
 Even if the life-cycle is mapped out, there still exist many
uncertainties as to the environmental impact of the
processes involved.
 There is still an immense lack of reliable data.
 Also consider uncertainties caused by customer behavior and
(unknown) future process technologies.
 Knowledge about environmental systems is often highly
uncertain.
 The LCA is generally a compromise between practicality
and completeness