LCA – Life-Cycle Assessment
Eco-Design and Innovation Management (Scenario Analysis)
Life cycle assessment is a methodology, which determines the environmental impacts of products, processes or services during manufacturing, use and disposal stages. This methodology is based on ISO 14040 series.
- Determination of goal, scope, and system boundaries
- Preparation of input – output inventory
- Assessment of potential environmental impacts with the help of the inventory
- Interpretation of the inventory and the impact assessment results according to the aim of the study
ISO 14040 ve 14044’e göre Yaşam Döngüsü Değerlendirmesi (LCA) Çerçevesi ve Uygulamaları
Life cycle assessment can be defined as the assessment of a product or service in terms of its environmental impacts through all life cycle stages such as manufacturing and use phase stages starting from the extraction of raw materials until the final disposal stage.
Performance of an LCA provides a variety of benefits for manufacturers. Through the observation of the manufacturing processes transparency in material flows is obtained as well as determination of optimization potentials. As a result of this the environmental performance of products can be expressed as quantitative values. Additionally, due to the enhancement and optimization of manufacturing processes resource depletion and costs can be minimized. Moreover, LCA constitutes a basis for comparison of products and allows to compare similar products on the sustainability platform. Besides these advantages, it is also possible to make scenario analysis, which can serve for innovation management. From marketing point of view, LCA increases the value and the competitiveness of a product or service on global and local scale. Besides contributing internalization of corporate sustainability studies, LCA also helps companies to be prepared for international and European norms, which got into force in recently.