Prospective sustainability assessment: the case of wood in automotive applications

Abstract

Purpose The introduction of renewable materials into automotive applications is perceived as an innovative lightweight solution. Wood-based materials are advantageous in that they have potentially lower environmental impacts as compared with other materials such as steel. However, using wood per se does not automatically ensure more sustainability. Few prospective sustainability assessment methods or studies on the use of wood-based materials in automotive applications have been carried out, although these are needed to reduce unintended, negative sustainability effects and to support sustainable oriented research and innovation. Therefore, this study was conducted to assess the potential sustainability effects and consequences of introducing a wood-based component into an automotive application. Methods A combination of methods was used to analyze the potential sustainability effects when introducing wood into automotive applications. This prospective life cycle sustainability analysis solely relied on secondary data. The environmental impacts were analyzed using a simplified environmental life cycle assessment on the product level. A multi-regional input-output-based assessment was conducted to model the country-specific environmental and socioeconomic consequences. The potential shift in social risks and opportunities on a national scale was analyzed by conducting a generic social life cycle assessment. Various aspects of each approach differ, with each providing a specific perspective of the system under study. Results and discussion The results indicate that implementing wood into automotive application can have environmental, social, and economic benefits, according to most of the indicators analyzed. Mostly due to the product weight reduction due to the use of a wood-based component, the results show that environmental impacts decrease. Some possible consequences of using wood-based materials are increased value added and increasing the number of jobs in European countries. Similarly, the social risks and opportunities are shifted from countries all over the world to European countries, which perform better than developing countries according to several indicators. However, some indicators, such as migrant acceptance or local supplier quantity, perform better in the current situation. Conclusions The presented case study is particularly notable, because the results clearly indicate the advantages of using wood-based materials in automotive applications, although the application of such relatively holistic and complex approaches often may lead to rather indifferent pictures. Policy makers, researchers, and companies can apply this combination of methods that rely solely on generic data to obtain both feasible and informative results. These methods also allow users to link the product level assessment with a regional and social perspective and screen critical topics to support sustainability research and innovation.

Green Practices for Global Supply Chains in Diverse Industrial, Geographical, and Technological Settings: A Literature Review and Research Agenda

“…Bobba et al, similarly, present a method to support environmental performances assessment based on second-use electric vehicle batteries [57]. Mair-Bauernfeind et al, instead, propose a combination of methods to quantify the environmental effects of introducing wood-based materials, instead of steel, into the components of the automotive industry [58].…”

“…Third, when looking at the processes described in the papers, we found that developed market-based papers tend to present research that analyses environmental sustainability applications across distinct supply chain phases or activities, e.g., product development [58,59], supplier relationship management [56,60], production [61], logistics and distribution [55,57,62,63], and customer relationship management [27,64]. In contrast, research related to developing economies is focused mainly on papers that deal with the supply chain as a whole, and there is no or little focus on specific supply chain processes, e.g., Messner et al, Villa et al,Bryceson and Ross [31,37,41].…”

“…However, decision making in sustainability fields is made more complex due to a series of influencing factors, such as the presence (or lack) of policy and regulations pushing towards sustainable behaviour, and the possibility to actually measure the environmental impact of the possible interventions. From this aspect, while developed economies have presented some studies [56][57][58], developing markets are lagging behind.…”

Domestic Value Added as an Indicator for Sustainability Assessment – a Case Study on Alternative Drivetrains in the Passenger Car Sector

“…Their analysis is based on detailed data from a research project. Mair-Bauernfeind et al (Mair-Bauernfeind et al, 2020) conducted a prospective sustainability assessment in order to assess what effect the substitution of a conventional steel-based car component by a wood-based has on a passenger car's sustainability. To cover country-specific environmental and socioeconomic substitution effects they applied a MRIO assessment method.…”

Interfacial Adhesion and Mechanical Properties of Wood-Polymer Hybrid Composites Prepared by Injection Molding

“…In order to introduce wood and wood-based materials in these new areas of application such as the automotive industry, it is necessary to consider new production technologies during the design of wood-based hybrid components. Mair-Bauernfeind et al [ 3 ] investigated the sustainability of wood and wood-based materials compared to other materials such as steel, where wood showed environmental, economic and social advantages. In addition, wood has also been increasingly used in multi-story buildings in the form of wood-concrete hybrid construction for several years.…”