Designing Sustainable Technologies, Products and Policies

This article summarizes the panel session “Life Cycle Management approaches to support Circular Economy” of the 8th International Conference on Life Cycle Management (LCM2017 conference, Luxembourg). Four panellists were invited to share their point of view on this topic. Each of them brought a different perspective, addressing the topic from both the academic and industrial point of view; focusing on a raw materials aspect or considering a life cycle (or eco-design) related scope; in the context of a certification process (for products or activities) or of an eco-innovation process (including new business models for circular economy). After short presentation by each of the panellists, the discussion especially addressed the complementarity between several LCM concepts to be considered jointly when developing circular concepts and models.

As the end of life products are becoming more and more complex, the recycling systems encountered many difficulties in valuing all the materials contained in each product. This involves not only recovering a large number of materials but also doing so with the minimal environmental impact. Although the benefits of recycling are well established, the industrial processes need to be designed in regard with their environmental impacts. Therefore recyclers need robust assessment tools to make the right choices during the design of recycling processes. This approach should enable them to choose the right recycling solutions for a wide range of end of life products. In this article, we present a methodology developped for evaluating the performance of recycling processes during their design phase. This methodology is our answer to help the optimisation of the recycling of multi materials products based on the evaluation of the sustainability performance of the processes chosen.

This paper synthesizes the authors’ experience in the area of integrated approaches coupling multi-objective optimization (MOO), industrial process modeling and simulation, and life cycle assessment (LCA), with particular application to the sector of drinking water production. An industrial process is intended as any process using a certain technology to produce a product or deliver a service. The paper discusses comparatively the suitability for the optimization of a real-world drinking water production plant (DWPP) of four optimization approaches, namely: (1) off-the-shelf global search metaheuristic algorithms, (2) hybrid optimizers combining global search and local search, (3) surrogate model based optimizers, and (4) local search.

Although circular initiatives emerge around the world, the process of decoupling the economic activity from resource consumption and environmental impacts is far of being achieved. The concept of circular economy embodies the opportunity to reconcile an improved resource use while reducing the environmental footprint. Appropriate assessment metrics and methodologies are needed to identify potential trade-off between these 2 sides of a single coin. In this paper, we apply the Material Circularity Indicator (MCI) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) to analyse tires end-of-life strategies aiming at improving the circular flow of all tire materials. Results reveal re-treading is interesting to produce trade-offs on environmental impacts while re-grooving offers a fully decoupled strategy that improves material circularity avoiding environmental burdens. Further improvements should integrate environmental assessment as well as economic factors to link micro scale to macro scale contributions to sustainable development.

In a circular society, material consumption should be a circular process where renewable resources and waste streams are used for new bio-based materials. In such a society, bio-based materials are also reused, repaired, recycled, and remanufactured. Not only choices on resources, but also other life cycle choices pertaining to circularity must be done based on technological, environmental and economic basis. For this session, presentations and discussions regarding life cycle management of bio-based materials were suggested. The session had five oral presentations and six poster presentations that gave a general picture of a broader environmental and a positive economic result on a life cycle basis when renewable raw materials are used, while further exploration of the technical aspects within circularity and end-of-life challenges are needed in the future.

European policies are advocating a transition toward “bio-economy”, an economy aiming at reducing the dependence from fossil-based resources, limiting greenhouse gas emissions and environmental impacts, safeguarding food security and ensuring a sustainable economic growth. Besides, circular economy policies are aiming at closing the loop of resources as much as possible. The application of circular economy principles to bio-economy could represent a valuable contribution to bio-economy performance optimisation. The present paper investigates the contribution of bio-economy to circular economy. It proposes a conceptual framework to assess the potential for circularity for bio-waste and related by-products and it puts forward some considerations on the application of this framework to food waste. However, both bio-economy and circular economy may imply environmental burdens if an integrated assessment encompassing all life cycle stages of production and consumption is missing. Hence, adopting life cycle assessment is crucial to unveil trade-offs and ensuring identifying the best options for bio-economy and circular economy implementation.

This session demonstrated the added-value of applying Life Cycle Assessment to address different types of issues related to the textiles sector. Each of the four presentations in the session was based on case-studies, also highlighted the important challenges to be faced regarding methodological issues and market issues, to make LCA fully efficient for the sector. In particular, it has been demonstrated that one of the main concern for the sector is toxicity assessment, which is currently limited due to lack of data inducing weaknesses in characterisation of substances contributing to this impact. It also has been shown that in the objective of developing circular models, multiple issues must be addressed simultaneously. For example, to increase recycling of clothing unsuitable for reuse, markets must be developed at the same time that infrastructure is developed and collection mechanisms are put in place. It must also be tackled in a sustainable way, supported by Life Cycle Assessment and Life Cycle Costing.

Cotton, the most important cash crop of India plays a dominant role in its agrarian and industrial economy. In India, the area under cotton cultivation is the highest in the world and industry provides livelihood to over seven million people. However, cotton productivity in India is low and farmers rely on heavy dosage of fertilizers and insecticides/pesticides to control insects, pests, weeds and growth regulators. Organic cotton farming is the process of growing cotton without the use of synthetic pesticides and chemical fertilizers. Better Cotton Initiative (BCI), is a concept to grow cotton with judicious use of water, chemical fertilizers and pesticides, to reduce the environmental footprint of cotton farming. The objective of the study was to quantify the environmental benefits associated with the production of organic seed cotton and BCI seed cotton compared to the conventional production of seed cotton, using Life Cycle Assessment approach. The aim was also to identify hotspots across the cultivation process. The study was based on primary data collected from farming sites managed by Arvind Group under contract farming model for BCI cotton and organic cotton cultivation in the state of Maharashtra, India. When compared with the conventional cotton system, the organic and BCI cotton show considerable advantage for several impacts categories.

Despite growing concerns over the environmental impacts of pharmaceuticals, the use of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) within the pharma-sector remains quite fragmentary. The aim of this paper is to present gaps and challenges, impeding a full adoption of LCA in the pharma-sector. A review of existing pharma-LCAs revealed a considerable degree of inconsistency and inhomogeneity in their methodological choices, highlighting the need for product category rules (PCRs) for the pharmaceutical industry to harmonize and facilitate the future use of LCA in that sector. Additionally, existing life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) methods fail to model several pharma-specific impact pathways (e.g. endocrine disruption). Preliminary thoughts on the development of pharma-PCRs and the inclusion of pharma-specific impact pathways into LCIA are presented, providing important stimulus for further research.

Novo Nordisk has used Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for many years and a few years ago the company took a major step forward and completed a mapping of the product carbon footprint of the company’s key products. Through successful cross-organisational collaboration, technical LCA data and results have been translated into easy-to-understand messages that have helped the organisation to understand the LCA concept, drive improvements across the life cycle and to communicate about the environmental impact of products to external stakeholders such as patients, healthcare professionals, payers and policy-makers.

This paper provides a summary of what has been presented and discussed at the 8th international conference on Life Cycle Management (LCM 2017 conference, Luxembourg), during the session entitled “Improving the life cycle performance of chemical products and materials through data exchange along the value chain”. The purpose of the session was to demonstrate how to assess and manage the global sustainability of chemical products and materials, taking into account their whole life cycle, to achieve real improvements. Over the six oral presentations, the most challenging issues regarding availability and transparency of Life Cycle Inventory data from the chemicals industry were discussed. Some approaches developed in order to face these challenges were detailed, illustrated also with the presentation of some specific case-studies.

Fossil resource and greenhouse gas savings can be claimed when certified biomass is co-fed with fossil raw materials into a highly efficient interlinked production network. BASF and partners have developed a novel biomass balance certification standard for chemical synthesis. It offers a reliable response to customers and end consumers who are increasingly interested in solutions that are based on renewable feedstock without compromising resource efficiency and performance. The new standard describes how renewable feedstock is attributed to a given sales product. Existing products can thus be derived from biomass and provided with third-party certification. Highest technical product standards can be maintained while fostering the strategic goals of a bio-economy, often requested from different stakeholders.

Emerging economies play an increasingly important role in global food security. They often rely on fossil fuels, lag behind on food governance and are characterised by subtropical climates, often requiring energy intensive irrigation and refrigerated storage. Mitigation options for agri-food value chains in emerging economies are novel and have substantial sustainability potential. The session on Greening Agri-food Value Chains in Emerging Economies at the 8th International Conference on Life Cycle Management showed the manifold challenges of emerging economies on their transition path to contributing to a sustainable global food system. LCA can support this path by identifying specific environmental hotspots in food value chains as well as by evaluating and prioritising potential solutions from an environmental perspective.

Milk production in South Africa has increased substantially over the past ten years and is associated with various environmental impacts. These can be reduced by different means, four of which were analysed in this study: choice of breed, the use of methane emission reducing feed additives, solar power as well as variable frequency drive usage in fodder irrigation. The results showed that Holstein cows had a lower impact than Ayrshire cows per litre of milk, but that differences between farms were greater than between breeds alone. The feed additive 3-nitrooxypropanol (3NOP) led to an 18% reduction in the climate change impact category, and did not have negative effects in other categories. Using solar power for irrigation decreased the environmental impact by a larger degree than integrating a variable frequency drive to reduce the electricity demand of the water pump. All four are adequate means of reducing the environmental impact of milk.

The presentations addressed the topic of food waste management in a circular economy from various angles. Understanding the amount of food waste generated and setting measures to prevent it should be the starting point. Any not prevented food waste should be valorised aiming at a positive triple bottom line (social, economic and environmental). The huge environmental and economic potential of co-digestion of dairy manure and food wastes by linking waste producers with costumers for derived products was demonstrated for the US. Further the link between bio-waste, compost and soil quality is highlighted which contributes to food security and the wider bio-economy. Looking forward research into the application of selected agri-food wastes to produce alternative sources of protein could result in more sustainable source of proteins able to compete with industrial chicken production. Overall, the presentations and discussions showed the multi-facetted nature of food waste management emphasising that a range of measures by many stakeholders are required to move towards a circular economy society.

The increase of separate collections of bio-waste, largely represented by food waste, and their biological treatment is an essential feature of the waste management strategy. The aim of this paper was to highlight the role of compost in the circular economy, and its use in the agricultural sector. An annual time-step model for estimating soil organic matter (SOM) stock dynamics in a 22-year time frame was developed and tested on cardoon cropping system. The model took into account few soil parameters, mean annual temperature, and the cultural systems management, in particular organic fertilizers and crop residues. This work indicates that compost use in agriculture would be beneficial both for SOM increase and GHG reduction. The results showed how high-quality compost could represents the actual driving force of this change able to connect food, waste, economy and environment.

Substitution of food out of alternative biomass sources is aimed to supply consumers with food products similar in nutrition and with lower environmental impact compared to conventional products. At current state of development, meat substitutes are not competitive with chicken meat, except for plant based meat analogs (although they have weaker nutritional profile). Upscaling, further technological development and use of agri-food waste as main source substrate can assure the environmental benefits of insects (2 kW h of energy, 1 kg CO₂ eq., 1.5 m2 of land and 0.1 m3 of water) and single cell products (10 kW h, 2–4 kg CO₂ eq., 0.5 m2 of land and 0.25 m3 of water), making them more competitive compared to industrial chicken production. The results of the current research are preliminary and further studies are required to assure the industrial applicability of agri-food wastes use for food production.

This paper presents a summary of the session “Implementation and management of life cycle approaches in business—challenges, opportunities, business learnings and best practice”. In the session, the audience got the opportunity to listen to examples from industry and ways to include life cycle approaches in their business decision making processes. The audience also attended presentations where learnings from the environmental footprint process were discussed. The conclusions from the presentations and the final panel discussion can be summarized in some key messages. To succeed we need to go together and that is why harmonization of e.g. methods and regulations are important. As a basis when developing the way forward it was concluded that the life cycle approach is an important tool.

The paper presents a procedure and a methodology of research which aimed at assessing and comparing the effectiveness of different variants of labels in communicating life cycle based environmental information (EU ecolabel, draft PEF labels). Based on a survey, an electroencephalography (EEG) and an eye-tracking, the information regarding consumers’ ecological awareness, their neurological reaction and a visual attention is gathered and used for identifying the ecolabels’ elements with the highest communication potential. A potential target audience of the project is not limited to the specialists in the environmental labelling, but includes also the readers involved in green marketing, Product Environmental Footprint and Life Cycle Assessment practitioners.

LCM studies of industry and academia show the increasing importance of implementing life cycle thinking in the transport and mobility sector. Tools facilitating the use of LCA in product development processes increase the relevance of this topic in companies. OEMs use LCM as decision support for decarbonisation strategies and operationalization of greenhouse gas reduction targets. Next to environmental impacts, financial and social aspects are considered for a holistic assessment of vehicles. Regional impacts of alternative fuels and power trains need to be considered to support the development of sustainable mobility strategies in nation states. Regional specifics are also included in new data sets for modelling flat steel production along the value chain. Introducing voluntary credit transfer options in automotive legislation is proposed to incentivize low-carbon innovations throughout the whole life cycle of vehicles.

Lightweight design is a major strategy in automotive development. The dominant motivation is a reduction of use-phase energy demands while retaining or improving technical performance. The application of new materials is the prevalent lightweighting strategy. Modern vehicle concepts extend material substitution up to the combination of different materials on a component level, so called hybrid designs. While engineering processes, methods and tools in design and production engineering are well established for conventional designs, hybrid designs pose new challenges. Lightweight materials as well as new manufacturing and recycling processes may cause increased environmental impacts. In order to achieve eco-efficient lightweight structures, energy savings from the vehicles’ use phase need to compensate additional burdens in other lifecycle stages. The current work presents findings gained in a public-private research collaboration. Its starting point is the understanding of the role of life cycle engineering towards its impact on overall sustainability goals. Based on derived key requirements, an integrated life cycle engineering approach is developed. Activities and interfaces between life cycle engineering, component design and manufacturing are elaborated. A special focus is set on the conceptual design stage, as emerging materials and manufacturing technologies lead to a broader concept variety. This stage presents also a major lever for shaping the life cycle environmental impact of components.

The paper provides an overview of how Siemens uses LCA methodology and tools to support cities in the decision-making process to promote sustainable urban transportation systems. It focuses on GHGs and local air pollution. Determining the cause of GHG emissions and air pollution requires flexible scopes and a highly parameterized, hierarchical model, which can be adapted to any city’s transportation system. Emission forecasting capabilities are very important since motorized transportation modes quickly change properties over time. The model screens a large set of infrastructure improvement measures by the click of a button and analyses their impact on KPIs for different years. Applicability, challenges and limits of LCA to the specific application of urban transportation system modelling are discussed.

Construction and demolition waste (CDW) generation, identified as a priority stream by the European Commission, accounts for approximately 25 to 30% of all waste generated in the European Union. According to local specificities (e.g. regulations, waste management organization) best environmental options may differ for transforming waste into new resources. Five oral presentations were given in the session which focused on innovative modelling initiatives combining LCA with complex models in order to improve knowledge for more sustainable urban construction waste management. During the discussions, all participants agreed that re-use or recycling mass performance is a weak and unsufficient indicator for assessing waste management systems. There is an important need for better characterizing stocks and predicting nature and quality of output flows. Geospatialized data combined with Material Flow Analysis was the methodology identified and used by the research community.

Directive 2008/98/EC on waste (WFD) provides that, within 2020, the preparing for re-use and recycling of non-hazardous construction and demolition waste shall be increased to a minimum of 70% by weight. Beginning from a screening of the current percentage of reuse and recycling, type of recycling (types of waste and destinations) and incentive policies in Member States of European Union-28, the research aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the Directive and possible ways of improvement through a Life Cycle based approach. In this paper the incentive policies and some critical issues regarding current regulations are analysed. Further ways to improve legislation are proposed as well as guidelines, which would have an effect on a local level and are aimed at making the recycling of CDW management more effective and sustainable through Life Cycle Management.

In a global context, where several international and national policies attempt to define strategic energy plans that address environmental sustainability, it is necessary to adopt a holistic perspective. In this session, we want to stimulate inputs on how Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) models can capture the complex management challenges in the whole energy sector. In that sense, the various sectors related to energy (namely heat, power, etc.) will become more interrelated, which will be challenging to deal with in Life Cycle Management (LCM). The next decades, LCM modelling of energy systems will have to be quite innovative in order to create realistic models. Furthermore, if LCA wants to do real LCM, the methodology should be widened to e.g. include long-term environmental implications.

When considering the Life Cycle Assessment of an energy-using product, usage is often modelled by average scenarios of use. One challenge of modelling is the availability of data to model the specific scenario in each case. This type of modelling requires the collection of data from several inputs. Also, it can be expensive and time-consuming to collect the specific data to improve the modelling of the use phase. This case study examines a truck refrigeration unit, for which the most environmentally impactful phase is the use phase. The energy consumption of the unit depends on usage. We highlight the importance of modelling a detailed usage scenario specific to each user and examine if it is enough to consider an average usage scenario. This study shows how a specific end-user Life Cycle Assessment and customized recommendation can contribute to improving the global environmental footprint. This is demonstrated by using the energy consumption life cycle inventory analysis of specific end-user behaviour based on experimental data and average scenarios. The results show how far we have to go in the collection of data.

To meet climate and sustainability goals a transition of the system of energy supply and use is needed. However, energy transitions are complex long-term processes and require a variety of methodologies to steer their direction. For this purpose, the combination of environmental, social, economic and technical assessments together with prospective energy scenario modelling is very promising but there are several challenges that need to be addressed to fully benefit from these methodologies. This paper presents the discussions held during a conference session on this issue. The solutions proposed facilitate the combination of energy system modelling frameworks and environmental and social assessments aimed at developing comprehensive prospective studies and feeding information to decision making processes for energy transition toward a low-carbon economy.

The energy supply chain is the backbone of industrialised societies, but it is also one of the leading causes of global environmental burden. Life cycle management (LCM) and life cycle assessment (LCA) are increasingly being used in combination with energy system optimisation models (ESOM) to better represent the energy sector and its dynamics, and facilitate better decision-making. The integration of ESOM and LCA can enable powerful analyses, but not without difficulties. In this chapter, we review studies linking a well-known bottom-up ESOM (TIMES) with LCA databases and identify the principal challenges and how they have been addressed. One of the main integration challenges is the identification of equivalent processes between life cycle inventories and ESOM databases: the mapping problem. Other concomitant issues such as double counting and parameter consistency have been identified and are also investigated.

Access to data on built environment databases makes nowadays possible generating models of the urban spaces to facilitate visualization and analysis of information and synthesize it in sustainability indicators to support urban planning decisions. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) can greatly benefit from this wealth of potentially available information. The use of LCA data in models developed in Building Information Modelling (BIM) platforms is likely to facilitate the implementation of quantitative environmental assessment in the construction field and their extension, from the building to the city level. Within sustainable urban planning and management, also Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) play a potentially important role, although benefits, co-benefits and costs associated with NBS projects still remain not sufficiently understood. All those aspects have been discussed via the presentation of case studies, proofs of concept and experts’ visions within this session.

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is increasingly used for buildings, however, mostly for post-design evaluation of the environmental impact. To use the results for optimization, LCA has to be integrated in the early design stages. While Building Information Modelling (BIM) is more and more applied in detailed design stages, simple 3D models are typically used to compare design variants in early stages. The objective of this paper is to introduce a simplified, design-integrated method based on these early BIM models with limited information. The early BIM-LCA method uses simple 3D geometry and a parametric LCA model. Methodological simplifications are introduced and a single indicator based on the certification system of the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB) is used to provide an intuitive real-time feedback for the designer. The method is applied to the conceptional design of a residential neighbourhood. The results highlight the great potential of using simplified LCA to quantify environmental performance for decision-making in early design stages.

Environmental performances assessment of urban projects is essential to meet the current challenges of urban sustainable development. In recent years, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has been applied to urban scale to assess complex systems such as districts, urban facilities and territories. Yet, application of LCA to large scale is challenging in terms of data modelling. To overcome this challenge, integration of Building Information Model (BIM) to LCA could reduce efforts during the data acquisition, as well as allowing the feedback of LCA results into BIM. To ensure interoperability e.g. with energy simulation tools, digital mock-up using an open information standard must be preferred. To answer this need, the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) developed the open standard CityGML which is an XML-based data model that defines classes and relations for 3D object in cities (e.g. buildings, roads, water bodies etc.). This format also provides for domain-specific extension to other objects or attributes using Application Domain Extensions (ADE). To date, LCA data requirements have not been fully integrated into the CityGML format nor its ADE. The aim of this paper is to propose extension of CityGML and Energy-ADE standards for exchanging information for LCA simulation at urban scale. The scope of the study is limited to the integration of information necessary for LCA of buildings’ construction and renovation. First, data requirements are listed and then compared to CityGML and Energy-ADE structures to identify missing information. Finally, propositions and recommendations are presented to fully integrate information needed for LCA at urban scale into CityGML and Energy-ADE. This paper paves the way for further integration of LCA models with CityGML.

Planning Nature Based Solutions (NBS) to address urban challenges requires an approach that embeds the multiple dimensions of NBS to effectively portray their use and impact. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) provides a comprehensive assessment methodology in this regard. This paper discusses the environmental assessment of NBS via LCA using urban metabolism as an overarching approach to model the urban ecosystem. Performing a dynamic assessment with time series data is suggested as a way of identifying hotspots of the indicators studied within a determined time frame, allowing the assessor to observe and mitigate extremities and make informed decisions on desired temporal patterns. Dynamic assessment is supported by two simulation methodologies: Building Information Modelling for the built environment and Agent Based Modelling for social behavioural patterns.

ArcelorMittal, world leader in steel production, is working together with industrial partners from the cement and chemical industries, other energy intensive sectors, for potential synergies between the respective manufacturing processes and how these could contribute to the reduction of overall CO₂ emissions. Based on this project, the session aimed at demonstrating the place of LCM methods and tools in support of regional and/or local policy frameworks. Industrial representatives and policy makers involved in the panel presented and discussed the technical and political challenges faced when developing and implementing disruptive technologies and associated business models.

The use of life cycle approaches—purely or in combination with non-life cycle methods—to assess product systems from a multi-dimensional perspective arises as a current need in the path towards actual sustainability. While pure life cycle approaches involve mainly life cycle sustainability assessment, a wide range of novel approaches are currently under study in order to overcome the limitations typically linked to multi-dimensional assessment and multi-criteria decision analysis. This is done through the synergistic combination of life cycle (mainly, life cycle assessment) and non-life cycle (techno-economic assessment, data envelopment analysis, energy systems modelling, agent-based modelling, land change and ecosystem services modelling, urban metabolism analysis, interdisciplinary policy assessment, material flow analysis, etc.) methods. The main potentials, fields of application and pending issues associated with these tools are summarised herein.

Life cycle sustainability assessments (LCSA) are a comprehensive source of information on product performance to support decision-making processes toward sustainable production and consumption. Multiple criteria decision aid (MCDA) approach provides a structured decision modelling that considers the value judgments of the decision-makers and it has been proved to be useful to support decision-making based on LCSA results. We proposed an approach able to take into account LCSA performances when making decisions. We applied our approach through a case study of tire life extension scenarios selection. The scenario with retreading is the solution that offer the best compromise between the three sustainable dimensions with more than 63% probability to rank first for Weighted sum, Topsis and Prométhée II MCDA methods.

Within the current political and industrial transition to a bio-based economy, food waste can be an alternative resource for biobased chemicals. This chapter describes a case study that evaluates the prospect for Swedish production of biobased chemicals such as succinic acid from food waste. The evaluation is addressed from multiple systems perspectives. From a technical and resource system perspective, the results of the case study show that production seems possible. However, from a social system perspective succinic acid production currently lacks institutional support and actor commitment and alignment for realizing development in Sweden. From an environmental and life cycle perspective, the scoping of the analysis is decisive for the results. The study shows that multiple perspectives complement each other when seeking a nuanced evaluation of technical innovation and give insights for the intended value chain.

Interpretation, presentation, and visualization of life cycle assessment (LCA) results are key steps for ensuring proper decision support. Despite the interpretation being a crucial step, it is often not performed in a systematic way. For example, sensitivity analysis, variability and uncertainties analyses, comparison with results coming from different disciplines and domains are not properly done. So far, numerous LCA studies have been published and are often used by decision makers (both in business and policy contexts) to support the identification of hotspots or for drawing conclusions from meta-reviews while missing a good interpretation. Moreover, improving current practices in the visualisation of the results may help both the interpretation and the communication of LCA by a broader audience.

Bar charts and other usual ways of presenting LCA results depict one average or typical situation, lacking to represent the diversity of individual cases and the uncertainties associated to input data or modelling assumptions. This paper presents ways of visualizing variable results in comparative LCA. The main concept is to perform at once calculations representing this variability. Based on Monte Carlo analysis, the approach is enabled by the LCA software RangeLCA, developed by RDC Environment. Results of all simulations can be plotted in function of one or two influential parameters. A clear and complete view can hence be obtained as well as more reliable conclusions. Instead of answering the question “Is a system better than another one in specific cases?”, the presented graphs help LCA studies to answer a much broader question: “In which range of situations is a system better than another?”.

Sustainability is becoming more and more a strategic growth driver for numerous companies. In this context transparency on the environmental strengths and weaknesses of products and processes and related opportunities and risks is crucial. Accordingly, the assessment of sustainability aspects is gaining importance for companies and their customers along the value chain. Life cycle-based methodologies as Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) but also other assessment systems are used in decision-making processes, product development and marketing activities. Many companies have a public corporate sustainability policy backed up with commitments in the form of quantitative targets. LCA methodology may be used as a tool supporting the identification of ‘hot spots’ in the value chain and measuring progress towards sustainability targets. In practice, however, common issues and challenges stand in the way of a full deployment of LCA methods in industry. It is important for companies to find common ground on how to implement these approaches, which data and impact assessments to be used and how results should be interpreted. ISO rules give a good basis for that work, though it is not sufficient for several questions. For exchanging experiences, updating or adopting methods, and generating data the International Sustainability Practitioners Network (ISPN) was created in 2012. The ISPN is an exchange forum for LCA methodology in the context of industry and comprises sustainability experts from a range of different industry sectors. To share experiences from the different activities, examples of good practices of this cross-sectoral initiative and to discuss opportunities for improving sustainability assessments within the companies are introduced. This article highlights challenges and solutions in terms of data availability and uncertainty, streamlining and using standardization processes as well as communication of results with non-LCA-experts.

This is the synthesis of the presentation of the session entitled “Sustainable design of complex systems, products and services with user integration into design” of the LCM-2017 conference. This session was interested in sustainable design which is of high interest for a large range of stakeholders. Indeed, customer’s expectations, regulations and market pressure are some drivers that moves design teams towards the consideration of sustainable dimensions over the life cycle of an industrial system. Integration of users into the product design development becomes more and more crucial, for example, through service oriented offers, involving the users as effective actors of the product design. One of the weak point associated being that users may have bad or unexpected behaviour during use phase, inducing then increased impacts and placing the use phase as the main contributor. New approaches, methods, and tools used by or for industrial stakeholders in order to face such challenges were presented and discussed. The session started with product oriented presentations and proposals, and slightly moved to the concepts of service oriented design and integration of human into the loop.

Car manufacturer’s innovation teams are mainly focusing on decreasing automotive consumption and may lead to risks of transfers of environmental impacts. So, engineers in innovation should be able to evaluate their innovations in a life cycle and multi-criteria perspective. In this paper, Groupe PSA’s approach for integrating the environmental dimension during the innovation phase is presented. An eco-design framework of reference has been developed in a collaborative manner by the environment team together with innovation leaders. It tackles both the issues of how to deploy environmental requirements in the innovation process, and how to generate an organizational learning. This methodology is explained through the example of the Stop and Start technology. The validation in the quality procedure is essential to make the approach sustainable.

Due to government policies and regulations as well as customer and societal demands, organizations around the world are looking for ways to manage their economic, environmental and social sustainability. One of the most frequently used standards for organizations seeking to manage their environmental responsibilities is ISO 14001. This framework, however, is generic because it can be used by any organization irrespective of sector, activity or core values. Therefore, implementation of generic guidelines might result in the use of alternative tools that respond better to specific organizational needs and that provide outcomes that can be useful for decision-making. Through case study methodology, this paper shows how Volvo Group, a world-leading producer of transport solutions, developed an internal environmental evaluation tool called Environmental Screening (EnvS) to improve the environmental performance of its solutions.

This paper aims to explore the topic of monetisation of environmental and social aspects. The content is issued from a discussion panel held in Luxembourg during the LCM2017 conference. It first explores historical and methodological aspects. The recommendations are made for companies who intend to monetise their impacts. Three industrial companies presented their contribution on their day to day use of monetisation. The key conclusions are twofold. In one hand, many challenges remain. The implementation is still not always feasible for all issues and an iterative approach is highly recommended. New methods on social LCA show a growing interest on this topic from various parties. ISO standards work is progressing and will support companies and government in their use of monetisation. From the company point of view, monetisation is a bridge between environmental and social assessment, and economic evaluation, while it provides a common unified unit (money). By using a common unit for financial and non-financial aspects, monetization allows the direct comparison of different aspects and therewith a more informed materiality assessment. By looking at impacts, a new perspective on current and future business risks and opportunities is provided. A better understanding of interdependencies enables more informed decision making. The monetary language is a door opener to access new stakeholder groups such as finance and accounting to raise awareness for sustainability.

This paper illustrates the use of life cycle assessment (LCA) methods to link human wellbeing to resource consumption. Based on a previously developed framework of the material requirements for human well-being, we use LCA and Input-Output (I/O) analysis, as appropriate, to estimate the life-cycle energy needed to meet the gap in living standards in two emerging economies, India and Brazil. We illustrate the relative contribution of different living standards components to energy requirements, as well as the uncertainty and trade-offs between upfront and long-term operating energy costs, and how these factors differ in the two countries. This analysis provides insights on how LCA analysis can be used to inform energy planning and its links to development goals.

What is absolute sustainability? This question has been the centre of discussion for many years now. During this session, several stakeholders tried to bring their own answer to the question, discussing issues like the current Science-Based Targets approach, SDGs, resource criticality and the development of targets based on the earth’s regenerative capacity. And while different topics were addressed and the need to develop more robust approaches was apparent, all presenters were aligned on the need to help companies incorporate the notion of planetary boundaries in their business practices in order to address as quickly as possible the environmental issues of the 21st century.

Most of the conventional environmental sustainability assessment methods, such as Life Cycle Assessment and environmental footprints, evaluate economic goods and services in terms of the nature or the function of the studied systems. As such, these methods overlook the variations in the overall magnitude of production and consumption patterns for the examined systems. As a result, the progress achieved in mitigating global environmental problems is likely to be slow and may be insignificant. Hence this study explores the interlinkages between the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Planetary Boundaries (PBs) using an DPSIR (Drivers-Pressures-State of the Environment-Impacts-Responses) impact pathway framework—in support of developing an absolute sustainability assessment method (ASAM). The study demonstrates that there is a substantial overlap between the SDGs and PBs. The science-based thresholds listed in the PBs can therefore be adopted as a complementary set of environmental boundaries for the SDG indicators. Overall, the study lays the foundation for advancing an ASAM that can guide policy- and decision-makers to operationalize the SDGs effectively.

In the seminar on “Financing Innovation and the Circular Economy (CE)”, organized by the European Investment Bank (EIB) in the context of the Life Cycle Management Conference 2017, experts of the EIB and EIB partner institutions (European Commission, Rabobank) spoke about the specific challenges involved in the transition to a CE and the role played by their institutions in accelerating this transition by means of appropriate funding, financing and advisory instruments. In short presentations, the speakers first explained the broader role of the EIB and the European Commission (EC) in supporting the transition to CE, as well as the general types of CE projects and the specific questions that project promoters can expect in project appraisal. EC, EIB and Rabobank representatives also presented the concrete support and products offered to innovative circular economy project promoters.

Regional development that is truly sustainable depends on the adoption of systematic and long-term criteria for decision-making at different levels, taking into account the full life cycle of raw materials and products, as well as of infrastructure projects. This session invited the presentation of life cycle management applications from both a scientific and a practitioner point of view, highlighting examples and case studies at regional level. The applications are relevant to private actors from different economic sectors as well as for public representatives responsible for regional planning and administrative procedures.

Life Cycle Assessment experts are working on environmental assessments with both feet on the ground and faced every day with challenges around data quality, allocation and other challenging topics. But what’s the perspective of the people that are the audience of the results: “How do they look at LCA?” The objective of this session was to show the value LCA has for people outside the LCA Community that are not as familiar with the topic as the Experts. Sanjeevan Bajaj (FICCI), Namy Espinoza-Orias (Nestlé), Pawin Boonyaporn (Advanced Biochemical), Jens-Christian Holst (Siemens) and Aubin Roy (AvniR) shared their experiences.

Nestlé’s purpose is to enhance the quality of life and contribute to a healthier future. In practice, it is translated into product development through a life cycle, multi-criteria, and integrated approach engaging internal and external stakeholders. An overview of the company’s values is presented as well as its creating shared value business principles, followed by an explanation of the Sustainability by Design program and how it is embedded into product innovation and renovation. The integrated development of a breakfast solution for children who skip breakfast exemplifies this approach. Being proactive and understanding that what matters to consumers entails all aspects of the product—going beyond quality and including sustainability—enriches the product development process, informs decision-making timely, provides consumers with a product they prefer, delivers competitive advantage, and supports the fulfilment of Nestlé’s public commitments.

This paper presents the City Performance Tool (CyPT) approach, a LCA-based methodology for sustainable infrastructure decision support. The work presents an outside-in view about the methodology, details about the underlying LCA models and its implementation into a tool. The results for three different cities will be presented and a general conclusion for the use of LCM-based decision support from a business perspective will be given.

This session gathered contributions showing how Life Cycle Thinking can feed in the development of sustainability criteria, the certification and, ultimately, the policy making for bio-based products and processes. The session was composed of five presentations related to methodological approaches, case studies and real life examples, which were followed by a panel discussion. The addressed subjects covered the sustainability assessment of bio-based plastics, marine biotechnology processes, bio-based lubricants and forestry sector, and the assessment of the water scarcity. Key issues which emerged from the discussion include: the methodological difficulties in comparing bio-based and conventional products; the availability of data; the need to keep research focused on practical applications and increase the interest of industry.

The biotechnological development has traditionally focused on the compliance with regulatory demands rather than optimising the processes or analysing their sustainability. This work proposes the combination of available tools for the comprehensive sustainability assessment of a blue biotechnology process based on the cultivation of the microalgae Haematococcus pluvialis. The work aims to include environmental, economic and social dimensions to measure the sustainability of the production of a carotenoid with potential applications in food, nutraceutical, cosmetics and eventually pharmaceutical industries. Electricity for cultivation was identified as the major contributor to the environmental impacts, which depended significantly on the production scale. Social benefits were mainly related to workers and consumers, while the economic assessment suggested a profitable process with a relatively short period to recover the initial investment.

In order to design and develop a sustainable bio-based plastic product right from its development phase, it is necessary to analyse and interpret the direct and indirect environmental impacts along the life cycle of the product system through life cycle thinking. Eco-design is a well-established approach in designing products with the consideration and integration of the environmental impacts of the product system, and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a standardized methodology to quantify and analyse the environmental impacts of the product system along the production chain. This paper identifies the practical needs for integrating LCA and eco-design strategies into the production of bio-based plastic products, taking a bio-based computer mouse body made of Poly Lactic Acid (PLA) as a case study.

Life cycle assessments (LCAs) and Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) have long been pointed to as tools to be used in green public procurement (GPP), but doing so in practice is challenging. How can such information be requested without breaking some of the general principles for public procurement, for example non-discrimination and transparency? This session was meant to give insights from different stakeholders through five presentations providing different perspectives on this issue. The individual presentations were followed up on by a panel discussion.

The paper discusses the possible use of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) in European and Italian Green Public Procurement (GPP) for the building sector, in order to define targets based on objective and reliable building environmental impacts information. The research objective is to define how to set LCA benchmarks towards the improvement of GPP requirements. The study analyses the GPP criteria based on LCA in Europe with a focus on Italy; it proposes LCA benchmarks for selected groups of construction materials and scenarios for the implementation of LCA benchmarks related to buildings elements and whole-buildings. It also illustrates how public administrations can verify the GPP criteria achievement using EPDs.

The Product Environmental Footprint (PEF) Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) method has been adopted by the European Commission in 2013 as part of the Communication “Building the Single Market for Green Products” [1]. Since then a pilot phase involving about 300 companies, industry associations, NGOs and governments has been launched to develop product category rules for more than 20 different product groups. In this session it was discussed the status of play of the work done till now and its future perspective.