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Estimating Environmental Behavior Without Performing a Life Cycle Assessment
Author(s) -
ColladoRuiz Daniel,
OstadAhmadGhorabi Hesamedin
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
journal of industrial ecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.377
H-Index - 102
eISSN - 1530-9290
pISSN - 1088-1980
DOI - 10.1111/j.1530-9290.2012.00510.x
Subject(s) - life cycle assessment , relevance (law) , product (mathematics) , industrial ecology , product lifecycle , scale (ratio) , product life cycle management , computer science , duration (music) , environmental impact assessment , point (geometry) , risk analysis (engineering) , new product development , sustainability , engineering , business , production (economics) , mathematics , ecology , economics , art , law , macroeconomics , literature , biology , geometry , marketing , political science , mechanical engineering , quantum mechanics , physics
Summary Many authors have agreed on the interest of considering environmental concerns in the early stages of product development. However, most eco‐design tools are based on life cycle assessment principles and require a model to give information about the product's environmental performance. This modeling can have negative effects on team performance and on the potential for innovation, not to mention on the project's duration. Additionally, the model requires information that is not available in the early design stages. This article analyzes the potential of inferring conclusions about the life cycle stages with the highest impact by using similar products. From a database of previous products, environmental profile estimations are carried out, that is, the assessments of the contribution of each life cycle stage to the total impact and the variability of this measure. It is then possible to discard—or ensure consideration of—life cycle stages. Furthermore, the level of the conclusions is assessed on a five‐point scale. The proposed approach is applied to four case studies with different levels of abstraction and the relevance of the conclusions is assessed. The article resolves the problems regarding potential for estimating the distribution of the environmental impacts along the life cycle.