This report presents a comparison of the requirements of the GHG Protocol Product Life Cycle Standard and the ISO 14040 series, with the purpose of assessing to what extent a Life Cycle Assessment study performed according to ISO 14044:2006 and ISO 14067:2018 can be applied for reporting according to the GHG Protocol, and what possible additions or modifications may be required for this purpose. The study has been conducted for Mærsk A/S (Maersk) in January 2022 by Bo P. Weidema of 2-0 LCA.
The current practice for assessing the environmental life cycle impacts of a product system is limited to the activities that respond directly to a change in demand. The revenue resulting from this change in demand is then used to pay for primary factors, such as wages and taxes, while the redistribution of that money is left outside the system boundaries. The aim of this paper is to address this limitation by providing a method in which the second order effects, i.e., the effects of re-spending that money, are included. For that, an income distribution model based on a simplified stock-flow consistent framework was developed. The method is applied in a closed economy consisting of six industries, banks and three household income groups. The dynamics of the income redistribution effects are studied throughout the rounds of (re)distribution, showing that the perturbation has a permanent effect on the economy, from environmental and social perspectives, and major changes occur in the first period of distribution. In addition, the paper also provides insights on the next steps for developing a full-scale model and discussions on the relationship between income distribution and productivity growth.
This file provides the necessary impact data, links to SDG indicators, and a 2022 update of the Social Footprint method. The file also includes instructions for software implementation and guidance for performing a quantitative life cycle sustainability impact assessment, applying an impact pathway framework that links pressures from human activities via cause-effect chains to their impact on sustainable wellbeing.
The unique contribution of the current method is the use of sustainable wellbeing (utility, measured in Quality-Adjusted person-Life-Years, QALY) as a comprehensive summary indicator for all social, ecosystem and economic impacts. This allows to quantify trade-offs and synergies between impact categories, to compare business decisions, performance, and improvement options across industry sectors. By applying the exhaustive ‘capitals’ approach to defining the Areas of Protection, the method ensures comprehensiveness in terms the set of impact categories covered.
Data is in the form of a Zip file (27.4MB)
“Relative importance of sustainability impact pathways – A first rough assessment” provides guidance to focus the data collection and the development of further precision and accuracy of indicators and characterisation factors (linking the quantified impacts to their quantified causes) on the impact pathways that are of particularly high relative importance. This top-down assessment of importance is done by using Quality-Adjusted person-Life-Year (QALY) as a unit for sustainable wellbeing, informed by the annual UN measures of subjective wellbeing, and using the exhaustive classification of the so-called capital models as ‘Safeguard subjects’ to provide a structured and exhaustive account of the current impacts (estimated for year 2019) on each of the ‘Areas of Protection’, covering both instrumental values (productivity, value added, or income) and the intrinsic values of natural and manufactured assets, human capabilities, and social networks.
The report is prepared by Bo P. Weidema for the 2.-0 SDG Club and the UNEP Life Cycle Initiative as part of the project “Linking the UN Sustainable Development Goals to life cycle impact pathway frameworks”.
Data collection guideline for pressure indicators for Life Cycle based Sustainability Assessment” that covers the specific issues of each pressure category indicator (in LCA parlance called inventory indicators) in the above framework. The pressure category indicators are organised in groups, covering the triple bottom line of economic, ecosystem (resources and emissions), and social (mainly occupational) indicators that are relevant for data collection in the foreground system, i.e., the activities that are under direct control of a decision maker.
This guideline is prepared by Bo P. Weidema of 2.-0 LCA consultants, Denmark, for the 2.-0 SDG Club and the UNEP Life Cycle Initiative as part of the project “Linking the UN Sustainable Development Goals to life cycle impact pathway frameworks”.
We are grateful to UNEP Life Cycle Initiative and the following business members of the project for supporting the development:
• ArcelorMittal (corporate.arcelormittal.com)
• Corbion (Corbion.com)
• Janus (janus.co.jp)
• Novozymes (Novozymes.com)
The use of Semantic Web and linked data increases the possibility of data accessibility, interpretability, and interoperability. It supports cross-domain data and knowledge sharing and avoids the creation of research data silos. Widely adopted in several research domains, the use of the Semantic Web has been relatively limited with respect to sustainability assessments. A primary barrier is that the framework of the principles and technologies required to link and query data from the Semantic Web is often beyond the scope of industrial ecologists. Linking of a dataset to Semantic Web requires the development of a semantically linked core ontology in addition to the use of existing ontologies. Ontologies provide logical meaning to the data and the possibility to develop machine-readable data format. To enable and support the uptake of semantic ontologies, we present a core ontology developed specifically to capture the data relevant for life cycle sustainability assessment. We further demonstrate the utility of the ontology by using it to integrate data relevant to sustainability assessments, such as EXIOBASE and the Yale Stocks and Flow Database to the Semantic Web. These datasets can be accessed by the machine-readable endpoint using SPARQL, a semantic query language. The present work provides the foundation necessary to enhance the use of Semantic Web with respect to sustainability assessments. Finally, we provide our perspective on the challenges toward the adoption of Semantic Web technologies and technical solutions that can address these challenges.
Corporate author(s): 2-0 LCA, Directorate-General for Environment (European Commission), Heid und Partner Rechtsanwälte GmbH, Pré, RISE, Umweltbundesamt.
Around 40% of global raw materials that are extracted every year accumulate as in-use stocks in the form of buildings, infrastructure, transport equipment, and other durable goods. Material inflows to in-use stocks are a key component in the circularity transition, since the reintegration of those materials back into the economy, at the end of the stock's life cycle, means that less extraction of raw materials is required. Thus, understanding the geographical, material, and sectoral distribution of material inflows to in-use stocks globally is crucial for circular economy policies. Here we quantify the geographical, material, and sectoral distributions of material inflows to in-use stocks of 43 countries and 5 rest-of-the-world regions in 2011, using the global, multiregional hybrid units input–output database EXIOBASE v3.3. Among all regions considered, China shows the largest amount of material added to in-use stocks in 2011 (around 46% of global material inflows to in-use stocks), with a per capita value that is comparable to high income regions such as Europe and North America. In these latter regions, more than 90% of in-use stock additions are comprised of non-metallic minerals (e.g., concrete, brick/stone, asphalt, and aggregates) and steel. We discuss the importance of understanding the distribution and composition of materials accumulated in society for a circularity transition. We also argue that future research should integrate the geographical and material resolution of our results into dynamic stock-flow models to determine when these materials will be available for recovery and recycling.
This article met the requirements for a Gold-Gold JIE data openness badge described in http://jie.click/badges
Modeling the use or the supply of recycled materials in a product-oriented Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is challenging and a step in LCA that is typically associated with diverging practices and outcomes. In the ambition to harmonize LCA practices and increase the comparability of studies, the European Commission published the Product Environmental Footprint Guide, with the Circular Footprint Formula to model recycling. The formula considers the market situation of recycled materials, which is consistent with a consequential LCA perspective. Therefore, this paper evaluates the extent to which the Circular Footprint Formula follows a consequential LCA approach. To evaluate this, the considered consequential approach is first systematized in the form of a Causal Loop Diagram that shows the relevant parameters and their relationships. From the diagram, a formula is extracted in the same style of the Circular Footprint Formula, enabling comparison. It is concluded that the Circular Footprint Formula has the potential to, but at the moment does not, provide a full consequential approach. Main discrepancies between the Circular Footprint Formula and consequential LCA are 1) the lack of including the marginal suppliers and marginal users of materials instead of average or specific suppliers and users in the life cycle under study, 2) predetermined limitations of the extent to which substitutions can be modeled, and 3) an incomplete modeling of the effects of recycling when demand is constrained. A few inconsistencies were identified that merit to be corrected in an updated version of the Circular Footprint Formula. It is acknowledged that the Circular Footprint Formula does not claim to be consequential. However, alignment of the method with a clear LCA objective – such as a reduction of environmental impacts – could enable the production of LCA results that better inform decisions of companies, consumers, and policymakers.
The project will provide a globally unique tool for quantitative assessment of the climate effects of decision alternatives, popularly speaking a ‘climate footprint generator’, as well as a mechanism to ensure its continued updating. The project addresses a lack of updated, detailed, globally complete, valid, and trustworthy LCA data. The project expands the level of detail, coverage, and applicability of the currently most advanced hybrid input-output database (EXIOBASE 3).
Read more about the project, the work packages, and the project partners at the project page at Aalborg University (DCEA).
Publication from the project: Input-output modelling for household activity-level environmental footprints: a systematic literature review.
