Skip to main content
All CollectionsEU TaxonomyTerminology and Definitions
Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA)
Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA)

This article helps you understand what a life-cycle assessment is, and how to perform one whenever the EU Taxonomy requires you to do so.

Rutger avatar
Written by Rutger
Updated over a week ago

A Life-cycle Assessment (LCA) is an analysis of the impact of a product/company/service on the world around it.

It is a framework to measure impact in four stages, which was further standardised by ISO 14044 (which can be used to easily obtain LCAs for your company's activities, or the company itself).

Stages of the Framework

The framework is segregated into four stages:

1) Goal and scope

Here, you determine what we want to measure.

  • You define the product/company/service you want to measure

  • You define which system to use to measure it

    • What will we be assessing? (product, company, service)

    • What system will we be assessing in?

    • Which impact category is important (CO2, water, input (i.e., fertiliser, pesticide)?

    • What should be excluded from the analysis? Important step as in theory, an LCA will never be fully finished, and can go very deep, so it is important to set limits to the scope.

You cannot compare LCAs to one another before first comparing their goals and scopes.

The Product Category Rules (PCR) define how to analyse a certain product or industry.

2) Life Cycle Inventory

Here, you collect and structure the necessary data.

You must determine what data you need.

After that, you will need to collect all the inputs and processes that you want to measure.

This generally includes:

  • Raw materials and bill of materials

  • The energy used and bought (type)

  • Water

  • Emissions to air, land, or water by substance

  • Supplier data

  • Everything that goes into and flows out of the system that is being measured.

The easiest way of structuring your data is in a flow-chart of a tree-chart which starts with inputs, progresses to processes, towards outputs and waste.

How to collect your data?

  • Data collection sheet should be designed to be filled out by stakeholders in the company who have access to the relevant data;

    • A lot of data is already available (i.e., electricity and water bills);

    • Sometimes, industry averages needed;

  • Inventory Flow Models

    • Flow model - clearly shows system and unit analysed, the inputs and outputs;

    • Example below:

3) Impact Assessment

During this stage, you will translate the gathered data to represent impacts.

  • This is where the analysis of data occurs. You should look at Life Cycle Databases and scientific papers to define what the impact of your Life Cycle Inventory is.

  • You can sum up the impacts in category totals

    • Example: Category is CO2 (Global Warming Potential). You can then convert all other relevant emissions to CO2 - 1 kg of nitrogen will amount to 25 kg of CO2 in accordance with norm EN15804.

  • Three main tasks:

    • Selection of indicators and models

      • Impact Categories determined in 1) define what you want to measure impact in (i.e., impact of product on climate change in CO2 equivalent);

      • Impact categories need to be further defined;

      • Often times, some impact categories measured in 'equivalents'

        • Global Warming Potential (GWP) or climate change often measured in CO2-equivalents (1kg Methane = 25 kg CO2 equivalent; 1kg Nitrous Oxide = 298kg CO2 equivalent)

      • Common Impact Categories:

        • Human toxicity

        • Global Warming Potential

        • Eco-toxicity

        • Acidification

        • Eutrophication

    • Classification

      • sorting the Life Cycle Inventory and assigning it to the defined impact categories

    • Impact Measurement

      • Calculating the equivalents

      • Summing those up in overall impact category totals.

4) Interpretation

During this final stage, you interpret the meaning of the analysis' results.

Relevant questions to answer to during this stage are:

  • How high are your emissions?

  • How do your products compare? Can you improve any of them?

  • Can you improve your processes for manufacturing the products?

  • What are the biggest levers for you?

Based on the interpretation results, it is common to delve back into the analysis and re-assess certain, particularly relevant aspects.

The results have to be put in context to analyse the overall picture.

According to ISO 14044:2006, the interpretation of a lifecycle assessment should include:

  • Identifying significant issues based on our LCI and LCIA phase;

  • Evaluating the study itself, how complete it is, if it's done sensitively and consistently;

  • Conclusions, limitations and recommendations;

    • How high are the emissions of the product or service?

    • How does it compare to the other products in our portfolio?

    • What are the biggest leverages to reduce the impact of our product?

    • Can we be more efficient in manufacturing it?

Now that you have a better overview of what an LCA entails, you can either assign certain employees/team within your company to perform such an assessment for your company('s products), or can refer to an external third-party service provider for them to perform the LCA for you.

For an overview of the different third-party services, please consult this link.

Did this answer your question?