This book examines the question of what makes one design environmentally preferable to another. Graedel discusses data and analyzes the streamlined life-cycle assessment process in the context of the goals of a particular process or product. FEATURES Discusses environmental objectives as the basis of life-cycle assessment. Focuses on streamlined LCAs, a technique common in industry today. Includes unique coverage of the assessment of societal infrastructures (Ch. 12). Ends with a hypothetical discussion of what an environmentally perfect product might look like. Includes useful checklists for performing SLCA.

This book presents a collection of studies on current best practices for delivering sustainable development policies within supply chains. It critiques the limitations of existing business theory and practice on sustainable supply chain management, and discusses opportunities for new conceptual models for businesses to engage with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It examines how businesses can work towards implementing Sustainable Development Goals in the contexts of entrepreneurial initiative, industry collaboration and regional development. SDGs renew the sustainable development agenda for global communities and ask businesses and organisations to reset their sustainable development policies. A strategy to embed sustainable development principles into business operations along the supply chain operations, which has been a conceptual and, in many instances, practitioner, business and industry achievement of the past decades, is not enough to shift the economic and social conditions of poor populations around the world. How would the global supply chains of the future look like? What social relations does it envisage? How will businesses and organisations engage with societies, environments and complex institutional contexts in emerging markets and developing countries, which are faced with issues of population growth, needed leaps in infrastructure provision, educational and health improvements, cultural and institutional shifts? The books challenges current approaches to sustainable supply chain practices guided by discussion on SDGs. It reviews implementation issues of existing sustainable development approaches, assesses the advancement of sustainable development strategies and examines the opportunities for global value chains to increase their positive social and environmental inputs in regions, communities and organisations. The book collects both conceptual and empirical studies set in a variety of business and organisational contexts, such as manufacturing, retail, procurement, cities and industrial parks. It contests the accepted axioms of sustainable practices in the global supply chains and proposes new models for organisations and production networks to engage with societies and address market and production effects on communities and institutions.

Environmental Life Cycle Assessment (ELCA) that was developed about three decades ago demands a broadening of its scope to include lifecycle costing and social aspects of life cycle assessment as well, drawing on the three-pillar or ‘triple bottom line’ model of sustainability, which is the result of the development of the Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA). LCSA refers to the evaluation of all environmental, social and economic negative impacts and benefits in decision-making processes towards more sustainable products throughout their life cycle. Combination of environmental and social life cycle assessments along with life cycle costing leads to life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA). This book highlights various aspects of life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA).

Life Cycle Assessment

This book is a uniquely pedagogical while still comprehensive state-of-the-art description of LCA-methodology and its broad range of applications. The five parts of the book conveniently provide: I) the history and context of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) with its central role as quantitative and scientifically-based tool supporting society’s transitioning towards a sustainable economy; II) all there is to know about LCA methodology illustrated by a red-thread example which evolves as the reader advances; III) a wealth of information on a broad range of LCA applications with dedicated chapters on policy development, prospective LCA, life cycle management, waste, energy, construction and building, nanotechnology, agrifood, transport, and LCA-related concepts such as footprinting, ecolabelling,design for environment, and cradle to cradle. IV) A cookbook giving the reader recipes for all the concrete actions needed to perform an LCA. V) An appendix with an LCA report template, a full example LCA report serving as inspiration for students who write their first LCA report, and a more detailed overview of existing LCIA methods and their similarities and differences.

Life cycle assessment enables the identification of a broad range of potential environmental impacts occurring across the entire life of a product, from its design through to its eventual disposal or reuse. The need for life cycle assessment to inform environmental design within the built environment is critical, due to the complex range of materials and processes required to construct and manage our buildings and infrastructure systems. After outlining the framework for life cycle assessment, this book uses a range of case studies to demonstrate the innovative input-output-based hybrid approach for compiling a life cycle inventory. This approach enables a comprehensive analysis of a broad range of resource requirements and environmental outputs so that the potential environmental impacts of a building or infrastructure system can be ascertained. These case studies cover a range of elements that are part of the built environment, including a residential building, a commercial office building and a wind turbine, as well as individual building components such as a residential-scale photovoltaic system. Comprehensively introducing and demonstrating the uses and benefits of life cycle assessment for built environment projects, this book will show you how to assess the environmental performance of your clients’ projects, to compare design options across their entire life and to identify opportunities for improving environmental performance.