Page 380 - Materials Chemistry, Second Edition

364 6 From LCA to Sustainability Assessment

considered as an impact category, especially plastic waste thrown into the sea from
ships.
The inclusion of ‘casualties’ (E1) into impact assessment is difficult, but not
38)
impossible. A routine inclusion of this category into impact assessment does not,
however, seem to be adequate.
‘Impacts on health at the working place’ (E2) are more part of SLCA as in
this part of the LCSA (see Section 6.3.3) the working place and its impact on
the employees is at the centre of interest. However, efforts have been made,
particularly in Scandinavia, to enforce the inclusion of the working place into the
impact assessment. 39)
LCA remains an active area of research, where methodological developments
can be expected in future. These, for instance, include the definition of difficult
impact categories, the input/output and hybrid analysis, 40) the consequential LCA, 41)
and the correct applications of LCA and related similar analysis tools within life
cycle management (LCM). 42)

6.3.2
Life Cycle Costing – LCC

LCC is modelled according to the LCA pattern and sums all costs, which occur
in the life cycle of a product for one of the actors (e.g. supplier, producer, user,
consumer, recycler); these costs must consist of real money flows to avoid overlaps
between LCC and LCA. 43)
LCC is accomplished similar to the analogue LCA, both steady state models
by nature. The definition of a functional unit and system boundaries similar to
an LCA dealing with the same system are integrated. Ideally an inventory should
already be available; LCC can, however, also be accomplished as a stand-alone
analysis.
Although LCC calculations are actually older than LCA, it has not been standard-
ised so far with some exceptions. Already during the years of LCA standardisation,
practitioners of LCA were attracted by this method as a potential supplement
to LCA. 44) Researchers, practitioners and scientists proposed a combination of
simplified LCA and LCC under the name ‘eco-efficiency analysis’ for an easy and
45)
swift product valuation by use of valuing elements. As discussed in Section 4.3.3,
transparency of the latter is required for a comprehension of the results.
The topic was taken up by a SETAC Europe working group and published as
a book. 46) A short version corresponding in purpose and length to LCAs ‘Code

38) Kurth et al. (2004).
39) Poulsen et al. (2004).
40) Suh (2003).
41) Weidema (2001) and Steward and Weidema (2004).
42) Wrisberg et al. (2002), Rebitzer (2005) and Remmen, Jensen and Frydendal (2007).
43) Such an overlap may be caused by monetarisation of environmental damage in life cycle cost
calculation.
44) White, Savage and Shapiro (1996), Norris (2001), Shapiro (2001), and Rebitzer (2002).
45) Saling et al. (2002), Landsettle and Saling (2002), Kicherer et al. (2007) and Huppes (2007).
46) SETAC (2008).