An eco-balance is a synonym for the Life Cycle Impact Assessment result, representing the potential environmental impacts of a product system expressed in amounts of one or more impact category indicators.
The term eco-balance originated from German-speaking countries, where "Ökobilanz" (literally "ecological balance") became widely used to describe comprehensive environmental assessments of products and services. This terminology reflects the concept of balancing or accounting for all environmental burdens and benefits across a product's life cycle. Whilst the term eco-balance is less commonly used in contemporary LCA literature compared to terms like "environmental profile" or "product footprint", it remains synonymous with the Life cycle impact assessment result.
According to ISO 14040, Life Cycle Impact Assessment is the phase of Life Cycle Assessment aimed at understanding and evaluating the magnitude and significance of the potential environmental impacts for a product system throughout the life cycle of the product. The LCIA result quantifies these impacts by converting the elementary exchanges identified during the inventory phase into meaningful impact category indicators through characterisation models and factors.
The eco-balance provides a comprehensive picture of a product system's environmental performance across multiple impact categories, which may include climate change, acidification, eutrophication, resource depletion, human toxicity, and ecotoxicity, amongst others. This multi-dimensional assessment enables decision-makers to identify environmental hotspots, compare alternatives, and support evidence-based choices for improved environmental performance.
The synonymous terms "environmental profile" and "product footprint" are also used interchangeably with eco-balance and LCIA result, though product footprint sometimes emphasises communication to broader audiences rather than technical LCA practitioners.
