Economic Allocation in Life Cycle Assessment

Ardente, Fulvio; Cellura, Maurizio

doi:10.1111/j.1530-9290.2011.00434.x

Cited by 150 publications

(73 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…This distinction is echoed on websites that track metal prices, such as Reuters and InfoMine. Even with uncertain definitions, the concept of high and low values provides useful guidance when choosing an allocation approach (Ardente and Cellura 2012).…”

Section: Methods To Deal With Co-products For Metalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Harmonization of LCA methodologies for the metal and mining industry

Santero¹,

Hendry²

2016

Int J Life Cycle Assess

112

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Purpose The metal and mining industry routinely conducts life cycle assessment studies to monitor and document the potential environmental impacts of their products. These studies are typically conducted independently by the various commodity associations. To facilitate alignment of these methodologies, a working group comprised of interested industry organizations and their representatives was formed to propose uniform recommendations for key methodological choices. Methods Existing methodologies used by the participating associations were reviewed to identify areas of alignment as well as areas which could benefit from discussions and alignment. Recommendations for selected topics were then developed through a series of moderated discussions among the participating organizations throughout 2012 and 2013. Efforts were taken in the creation of the document to ensure alignment with the international standards ISO 14040 (2006) and ISO 14044 (2006). Four methodology issues were chosen to be addressed with respect to industry alignment: system boundary, recycling allocation, co-product allocation, and impact assessment categories. Results and discussion Recommendations for system boundary conclude that boundaries should include end-of-life disposal and recycling and, whenever possible, the product use phase, particularly for material and product comparison. For co-product allocation methods, the recommendations were based on the type of co-products being produced and included a range of options to guide practitioners' decisions. It was recommended for recycling allocation that practitioners use the avoided burden methodology. Lastly, for the life cycle impact assessment stage, it was recommended that life cycle assessments (LCAs) on metal and mining products should report the following impact categories: global warming potential, acidification potential, eutrophication potential, photochemical oxidant creation potential, and ozone depletion potential. It was recommended that inclusion of other impact categories will be periodically re-evaluated by the metal industry. Further, the recommendation is that, while impact categories included are limited to the five above, all life cycle inventory (LCI) datasets themselves should contain accurate and comprehensive inventory data, given reasonable accessibility and data collection cost constraints. Conclusions Methodological alignment for LCA studies in the metal and mining industry will lead to improved consistency and applicability of the LCA data and results. Specifically, these recommendations improve the consistency of decisions regarding system boundary, recycling allocation, co-product allocation, and impact assessment categories. Further research is suggested to improve the specificity of certain recommendations (e.g., allocation), as well as expand the scope of the harmonization efforts to include other methodological decisions.

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Section: Methods To Deal With Co-products For Metalsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Harmonization of LCA methodologies for the metal and mining industry

Santero¹,

Hendry²

2016

Int J Life Cycle Assess

112

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…It has been concluded that in most cases allocation cannot be entirely avoided by subdivision and system expansion [19], but can be problematic since it does not consider in how far the change in amount of co-products affects the output of the process [20]. Concerning allocation the pros and cons of physical vs. economic allocation have been the subject of an extensive discussion, which was conveniently summarized by [21]. [22] concludes that wherever physical causalities between functional units exist, allocation should be based on these causal relationships, however, that in some cases socio-economic demands are the driving force behind multiple-functions systems and therefore economic indicators best reflect the changes in the unit processes.…”

Section: Allocationmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Method for Real-Time Aggregation of a Product Footprint During Manufacturing

Smolek¹,

Leobner²,

Heinzl³

et al. 2016

J. sustain. dev. energy water environ. syst.

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To assess cost, time investment, energy consumption and carbon emission of manufacturing on a per-piece basis, a bottom-up approach for aggregating a real-time product footprint is proposed. This method allows the evaluation of the environmental impact of a batch or even single product using monitoring or simulation data. To analyze the infrastructure, the production plant is decomposed into modules that are in relation to each other via inputs and outputs. Distinguishing between modules for production, logistics, energy system, buildings and auxiliary systems, the different approaches for distributing resource consumption between the products are presented. Special attention is paid to typical scenarios that occur in production plants and problems that may arise from them. For example, the incorporation of standby-, setup-and ramp-up times, the energy consumption of the administration and the allocation of different products and by-products manufactured at a machine are taken into account.

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“…These prices are available on brokerage sites such as RISI (www.risiinfo.com). It is possible to make a mistake by not applying the economic allocation to the right point (Ardente and Cellura 2012). Because this is a gate-to-gate LCA, distribution impacts are not considered.…”

Section: Sensitivity Analysis Of Allocation Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%