What is a complete life cycle assessment?

A complete life cycle assessment in accordance with DIN EN ISO 14040/-44 provides you with detailed insights into the overall environmental impact of your product, process, or service. This detailed study examines all relevant stages of the life cycle and examines multiple environmental impact categories.

How does a complete life cycle assessment work?

When you let CompriseTec carry out a life cycle assessment for you, we strictly follow the procedure specified in ISO 14040:

Defining the goal and scope of the study

Together with you, we define the system boundaries within which the assessment is to be carried out. Among other things, this determines whether the study considers the environmental impact “up to the factory gate” (cradle-to-gate) or “up to the end of life” (cradle-to-grave). In this first phase, we clarify with you the purpose of the LCA. Is the study to be used internally or for B2B communication? This question determines the next steps. We also define which scenarios the LCA should consider and which environmental impact categories should be included in the calculation. Depending on the type of your product, there may well be differences here.

Creating the life cycle inventory

The second phase of the LCA mainly consists of modeling the system under consideration in our life cycle assessment software SimaPro. To do this, we usually need product data from you. For technical products, we use parts lists, component drawings, or extracts from your ERP system, for example. In addition to the product itself, usage cycles and disposal processes are also modeled here. The life cycle inventory thus forms the basis for calculating the environmental impacts.

Impact assessment

The third phase of the life cycle assessment involves calculating the environmental impacts. Here, all material and energy flows resulting from the life cycle inventory are converted into environmental impacts. You’ll be able to read exactly how this works in our upcoming blog entry. The impact assessment also highlights the individual life cycle stages, such as raw material extraction, production, logistics, use, and disposal.

Evaluation and interpretation

A life cycle assessment always aims to identify potential for improvement. Therefore, in the fourth phase of the life cycle assessment, a so-called hotspot analysis is used to examine which components or life cycle stages have a particularly high environmental impact. Thanks to the technical expertise of the experts at CompriseTec, we can provide you with meaningful and technically sound recommendations for action that you can use to improve your product in a sustainable manner.

What other services are included in a complete life cycle assessment?

In order for an LCA study to be considered compliant with standards, it must meet high documentation requirements. This service includes the preparation of a detailed project report in accordance with DIN EN ISO 14044. All phases of the LCA are documented here. Each assumption is justified, each data gap (and its relevance) is explained, and the structure of the life cycle inventory is shown. The report also contains information on data quality so that the reliability of the results can be better understood.

In a final project meeting, we will go through the results of the study with you and answer any questions you may have.