Inadequate documentation in published life cycle energy reports on buildings

Over the past two decades, energy efficiency of building operation has increased significantly. As a result, the percentage of building life cycle energy attributed to embodied energy has also risen. This percentage, as measured in recent LCA studies, ranges between 2% and 51% and is influenced by the different climatic, infrastructure, and building characteristics that comprise the input data for these studies. Comparing the results of these studies is helpful in understanding how different combinations of these characteristics influence the relative proportions of embodied and operational energy. However, results are also influenced by the subjectivity inherent in each LCA study. Thus, meaningful comparison of results requires documentation of study methodologies, as outlined in ISO 14041.

In this paper, 20 journal articles describing LCA studies of buildings were reviewed for their adherence to key ISO 14041 documentation requirements.

It was found that the majority of journal articles have inadequate documentation.

Journal articles are not subject to ISO 14041 requirements and, due to limitations in article length, some degree of documentation is necessarily omitted. However, since journal articles provide much of the publicly available data on the life cycle energy of buildings, a minimum degree of documentation should be provided to allow comparison between LCA results, without substantially increasing article length. Recommended documentation for journal articles that describe LCA studies of buildings, as proposed in this paper, includes: a list life cycle stages and unit processes included within the system boundary; a statement of calculation procedure; and the referencing of all data sources.