Purpose: Existing computational methods for life cycle costing (LCC) are few and appeared inconsistent with the very definition of LCC. This article improves the common matrix-based approach in life cycle assessment as applied to LCC, correcting previous errors.
Methods: Reusing a simple and hypothetical example, the authors derive the LCC from both the physical and monetary technology matrices. Accounting for the added value of all activities in the life cycle leads to a simplified computational structure for LCC.
Results and discussion: The results show that the definition of LCC and computational structure can be fully harmonized with life cycle assessments (LCAs) and simplified. In addition to eco-efficiency calculations, the vector of added values, if disaggregated over social groups, allows for distributional analysis. It is furthermore shown how LCC can account for costs shifting (economic externalities) in the same way as LCA highlights shifting of environmental externalities between different products, life cycle stages or actors.
Conclusions: Life cycle costing as defined by the sum of the added value over the life cycle is consistent with LCA and cradle to gate assessments in particular. The authors simplified the computation of LCC with either the matrix-based approach or the added values of upstream activities as an elementary exchange vector or matrix.
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Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is the study of the environmental impact of products taking into account their entire life-span and production chain. This requires gathering data from a variety of heterogeneous sources into a Life Cycle Inventory (LCI). LCI preparation involves the integration of observations and engineering models with reference data and literature results from around the world, from different domains, and at varying levels of granularity. Existing LCA data formats only address syntactic interoperability, thereby often ignoring semantics. This leads to inefficiencies in information collection and management and thus a variety of challenges, e.g., difficulties in reproducing assessments published in the literature. In this work, we present an ontology pattern that specifies key aspects of LCA/LCI data models, i.e., the notions of flows, activities, agents, and products, as well as their properties.
An increasing number of companies are expanding their environmental impact reduction targets and strategies to include their supply chains or whole product life cycles. In this paper, we demonstrate and evaluate an approach, where we used a hybrid Environmental Input-Output (EIO) database as a basis for corporate and product environmental footprint accounts, including the entire supply chain. We present three cases, where this approach was applied. Case study 1 describes the creation of total corporate carbon footprint accounts for three Danish regional healthcare organisations. In case study 2, the approach was used as basis for an Environmental Profit and Loss account for the healthcare company, Novo Nordisk A/S. Case study 3 used the approach for life cycle assessment of a tanker ship. We conclude that EIO-based analyses offer a holistic view of environmental performance, provide a foundation for decision-making within reasonable time and cost, and for companies with a large upstream environmental footprint, the analysis supports advancing their sustainability agenda to include supply chain impacts. However, there are implications when going from screening to implementing the results, including how to measure and monitor the effect of the different actions. Thus, future research should include more detailed models to support decision-making.
Monetary valuation, or monetarisation, is the practice of converting measures of social and biophysical impacts into monetary units so that they can be compared against each other and against the costs and benefits already expressed in monetary units. The fundamental question that monetarisation seeks to answer is how to valuate (impacts on) non-market goods (i.e. goods for which no market, and hence no price, exists, such as a clean atmosphere).
Monetary valuation is not a new idea. Since 1936, monetary valuation has been a common and essential practice in Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) of public and private projects with economic, environmental and social impacts. Monetary valuation allows for the overall assessment of a project, when the total monetarised and discounted environmental, economic and social impacts are aggregated into a single score (Net Present Value, NPV). If NPV>0 the project is worth carrying out. Alternative projects can, hence, be compared and the one with the highest NPV is deemed superior to all others.
Monetary valuation methods have been developed within the utilitarian paradigm of welfare economics inherent to both neoclassical and ecological economics. Welfare economics is the study of economic efficiency, i.e. how to maximise social wellbeing. When this wellbeing is maximised among equal and autonomous agents in and across generations, the goal of welfare economics becomes identical to the goal of sustainable development.
Some LCIA methods already include aspects of monetary valuation, notably LIME, EPS, EcoIndicator and Stepwise.
The main objectives of the study has been:
The study includes a literature review and benchmarking of both monetary valuation methods and their applications in LCA, as well as a web-based survey of the extent of use and opinions on monetary valuation methods among LCA practitioners.
The literature review identified a lack of uniformity in both classification and nomenclature and a general absence of consistent definitions of the different methods for monetary valuation. The study therefore includes a new classification with definitions of monetary valuation methods.
The benchmarking encompasses 8 monetary valuation methods and 12 applications for LCA. Each method and application is benchmarked according to 6 criteria:
with in total 50 sub-criteria, specifically developed for this purpose. Each sub-criterion is scored on a scale from 1 to 5 for compliance. Each score has been documented and justified with a text description.
Each method is described in terms of its application areas and the strengths and weaknesses of each method. Based on the evaluation of these features, LCA impact categories for which the method is recommendable are identified.
In general, conjoint analysis is identified as the most appropriate method for the majority of LCA impact categories, when directly observable market prices are not available. The budget constraint method can be used to minimise the uncertainty on the monetary value of a human life year and thereby for anchoring the values obtained by the conjoint analysis. The hedonic pricing method is recommended for impact categories where the impacts are directly observable and only use values are involved, such as the nuisance from odour, noise, traffic, or living in a crime-prone neighbourhood, and job-related nuisances such as psychological and ergonomic stress. All other monetary valuation methods are not recommended for LCA, except in very specific situations.
In practical LCA applications, conjoint analysis has unfortunately only been scarcely used in LCIA methods, pointing to the need for more studies to confirm the practical usability of conjoint analysis for monetary valuation in LCA. In contrast, there are many LCA applications of the abatement cost method, which is not recommended by our assessment, mainly because it does not provide valuation of damages.
The web-based surveys among LCA practitioners show a large interest in and support for monetarisation in LCA, but also a smaller group of respondents with legitimate objections to monetarisation. However, the majority of objections do not fundamentally reject monetary valuation, but rather criticize bad practice in its application. Also, stakeholder involvement and acceptance is stressed as important.
The different points of criticism identified in the surveys are addressed in the “Good practice recommendations” from the study. A decision tree is suggested, which takes into account both the scientific and procedural aspects identified as important in the surveys and in the literature review.
The surveys reveal a need for education and information to correct some misunderstandings about what monetarisation is and does:
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is increasingly recognized as a complete tool that supports decisions towards more sustainable product systems. However, the variability of results which, at times, are even conflicting, questions the robustness of LCA for decision support. The discrepancy of results has continued despite numerous attempts at harmonization and standardization of LCA methods. Different modeling approaches have been put forward to contextualize the decision to be supported, but this has had the perverse effect of greater variability of results and questioned further the suitability and objectivity of LCA as an appropriate tool. This paper explores the insights from economics that LCA can adopt to make it a more realistic, relevant and robust tool with which sustainable decisions can be supported. It argues that LCA is firmly rooted in neoclassical economics and that much could be gained with insights that have already been established for a long time in that discipline.
Bæredygtighed og bæredygtig udvikling
Global fordeling
Økonomisk vækst, grøn vækst, nulvækst, modvækst eller a-vækst?
Demokrati og bæredygtighed. Energiområdet som case
Det åbne lands unikke goder
Regelapparaternes udvikling
Renere teknologi - virksomheden, myndighederne og miljø
Planlægning i det åbne land
Fra vandmiljøplaner til "grøn vækst"
Byplanlægning, klimahensyn og bæredygtighed
Energipolitik og planlægning
Miljøkonsekvensvurdering (VVM og SMV)
Klimaplanlægning - en ny udfordring i den lokale planlægning
Miljøledelse
Bæredygtighed og virksomheders ansvar (CSR)
Livscyklusvurdering
Ecodesign
Innovativ projektevaluering
Landskabskaraktermetoden
Naturkvalitetsvurdering
Geokommunikation og bæredygtighed
Følgende metoderapport beskriver metoden bag et klima- eller miljøregnskab. Den tilhørende hovedrapport indeholder resultatet for miljøregnskabet for en pilot-kommune for året 2010. Først beskrives Input Output modellen FORWAST som ligger til grund for modellen. Dernæst beskrives de ændringer, som er foretaget i FORWAST modellen for at gøre denne anvendelig til klima-og miljøfodaftryksanalyser. Dernæst beskrives beregningsprogrammet SimaPro som bruges til at udføre beregningerne. Til sidst beskrives Stepwise-metoden, som benyttes i analysen af et samlet miljøregnskab.
Around 9% of global CO2 emissions originate from land use changes. Often, these emissions are not appropriately addressed in Life Cycle Assessment. The link between demand for crops in one region and impacts in other regions is referred to here as indirect land use change (iLUC) and includes deforestation, intensification and reduced consumption. Existing models for iLUC tend to ignore intensification and reduced consumption, they most often operate with arbitrary amortisation periods to allocate deforestation emissions over time, and the causal link between land occupation and deforestation is generally weakly established. This paper presents the conceptual framework required for a consistent modelling of iLUC in Life Cycle Assessment. It reports on a novel and biophysical iLUC model, in which amortisation is avoided by using discounted Global Warming Potentials (GWPs). The causal link between demand for land and land use changes is established through markets for land's production capacity. The iLUC model presented is generally applicable to all land use types, crops and regions of the world in typical LCA decision-making contexts focusing on the long-term effects of small-scale changes. The model's strengths and weaknesses are discussed.
Spatial planning establishes conditions for societal patterns of production and consumption. However, the assigned Strategic Environmental Assessments (SEA) tend to have a too narrow focus. In particular, there is a need for applying a system perspective in SEA, extending assessment beyond the spatial boundaries of a plan to further focus on global, indirect and cumulative impacts. These impacts are referred to as “systemic impacts”. This study proposes a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) procedure which can be adopted in SEAs of various types of planning. The procedure represents a first step towards operationalising LCA in SEA by adjusting LCA methodology to focus on the ways planners and planning processes can influence the environmental impacts of interconnected activities. The proposed procedure was tested on a case study of Danish extraction planning, and it was found to generate new knowledge for decision support. The procedure enabled identification of key systemic impacts, as well as it enabled formulation of recommendations for how to address these impacts in planning processes. On a more general level, this article demonstrates an application of LCA which until now has received little attention, and it highlights the role of spatial planners in facilitating cleaner production.
