Background: Which pollutants are rarely or never considered in LCA? Micro- and nanoplastics, as well as other substances of concern (PFAS, endocrine disruptors, nanomaterials, heavy metals), represent a growing challenge for the sustainability of industrial products. Current LCA inventories and methods only partially account for these impacts, limiting a comprehensive and reliable understanding of the risks associated with industrial products.
Workshop objectives: to address the following questions raised by members
Which plastic pollutants are rarely or never considered in LCA? What are the advances and limitations in LCA? Current status, methodological challenges, data, and best practices for a robust and operational assessment in an industrial setting. The goal is to provide an operational framework to guide product design and improvement toward safer, more sustainable, and circular solutions.

Workshop Agenda Hosted by CIRAIG:

Introduction and Overview:

• Review of SCORE LCA Project No. 2024-03.
• Presentation of the AWARE indicator.

Methodological differences and inventory choices:

• Water balance of a unit process. Challenges in ensuring mass balance and the consistency of water flows.
• Comparison of approaches to quantifying net water consumption (watershed differential vs. consumption flow).
• Discussion of characterizable elementary flows.
• LCA databases: use and operational limitations

Spatial and temporal refinement of calculations:

• Presentation of spatialization methods at the watershed scale (GIS, identification of sub-basins).
• Introduction to the monthly temporal resolution of AWARE factors and the consideration of seasonality.
• Use of sector-level aggregated factors when data is limited.

Interpretation of results and decision support:

• Reading and reporting results in world-equivalent cubic meters.
• Presentation of the main LCA software tools used to calculate AWARE and their operational limitations.
• Discussion of the marginality assumption, the identification of geographic hotspots, and complementarity with other impact indicators.

Examples from various case studies will be incorporated into the workshop to illustrate inventory development, spatial analysis, and the interpretation of water scarcity results. These examples

Despite LCA work establishing methods for taking biodiversity impacts into account, providing results and interpretations, and despite the IPBES conferences held since its creation in 2012, assessments by the Stockholm Resilience Centre show no progress in terms of damage to ecosystems (Biosphere Integrity) on a global scale: the limit has been exceeded for more than 16 years, i.e. since this damage has been assessed. It is therefore necessary to give greater prominence to this endpoint in quantified environmental assessments, in the recommendations based on these assessments, and finally in decision-making, in order to minimise damage to biodiversity and limit or even reduce the exceeding of planetary boundaries. In fact, LCA experts often consider it less uncertain to work at the ‘midpoint’ level. The European PEF has published a list of recommended midpoint indicators. These midpoint indicators will serve as the basis for future European regulatory requirements for reporting the environmental performance of products within the Digital Product Passport (DPP), under the Construction Products Regulation (CPR) and the Ecodesign Regulation for sustainable products (ESPR).

Furthermore, the aggregation method proposed by PEF does not directly provide an indicator for biodiversity. However, producing LCA reports based solely on the 16 PEF indicators (common practice) does not provide comprehensive, direct support for decision-making aimed at preserving or even restoring biodiversity. How can midpoints be better used to address biodiversity issues? Are there complementary methods to the interpretation of the 16 classic PEF indicators that could be quickly and reliably integrated into LCA work in order to systematically inform decisions on biodiversity (reducing damage to biodiversity and more specifically to ecosystem services)? This formal insight would be an essential prerequisite for decision-making.

Webinar program:

1. How can AI be used for life cycle analysis? Presentation by Laure Patouillard from CIRAIG (including ongoing work at UNEP)
2. What is the environmental impact of AI? Presentation by Etienne Lees-Perasso (TIDE)
3. Presentation of the framework for frugal AI, by Anna Medan from AFNOR

Contents of the workshop, which will be led by CIRAIG (in French with English support):

1. Introduction (15 min):
o Presentation of the various standards/methodologies for quantification: ISO 14040/44 and ISO 14067 for products, ISO 14072 for organisational LCA, GHG Protocol (Corporate Standard and Product Standard) and ISO 14064-1.
o Brief presentation of the uses of each methodology and the implications in terms of implementation time and the need for external verification.
2. Brief reminder of scopes 1, 2 and 3 of the Corporate Standard (15 mins)
3. Methodological differences between the GHG Protocol and LCA (30 mins):
o Comparison in terms of boundaries, capital goods depreciation, environmental indicators, biogenic carbon and LULUC, and multifunctionality.
4. Analysis of different calculation approaches and data types (30 mins):
o Presentation of the input-output approach (economic data or EEIO) and the process-based approach (physical data). Explanation of the strengths and limitations of each approach, as well as the methodological elements to consider for each approach.
o Presentation of the elements to be considered in order to adapt the emission factors drawn from a life cycle inventory database to the GHG Protocol Scope 3 emission categories.
5. Case study:
o Examples will be included throughout the presentation to illustrate the various methodological aspects presented.

LCA practitioners wishing to analyse a product in terms of its water footprint may use the AWARE LCA indicator, which is used in the PEF method. More broadly, the ISO 14046 Water Footprint standard provides a comprehensive methodological framework for taking into account the various environmental impacts associated with water consumption. The aim of the study is therefore to provide feedback on how water issues are addressed in product/system assessments: do companies/manufacturers use ISO 14046 (and if so, how?) or do they simply use an LCA indicator? In addition, it is proposed to carry out a case study using the AWARE LCA indicator, in order to analyse its advantages/limitations, particularly in terms of applicability: quality and completeness of the necessary data, geographical and temporal scales, interpretation of results, most suitable LCA software, consistency with ISO 14046?

Following the 2014 SCORELCA study on ‘Taking geographical factors into account in LCA’ and the 2015 study on ‘Linking LCA and GIS’, this study aims to review how the spatialisation of impacts is taken into account in LCA methods and tools (feasibility, relevance, etc.), and the state of the art in their integration into expected LCA studies (particularly those required by regulations) and completed studies (as evidenced by published studies).

Cas des bio-carburants : Le JEC (regroupement de la DG JRC avec les industries pétrolière et automobile) prend en compte la capture du carbone de l’atmosphère dans le bilan GES de production.Autre approche DG JRC, notamment pour les plastiques bio-sourcés : Le JRC recommande de ne pas intégrer le carbone absorbé par les plantes dans le bilan GES biogénique (Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of alternative feedstocks for plastics production – 2021, document de position du TAB de PEF) « afin que les bilans cradle to gate ne présentent pas de valeurs négatives » (cf. échanges au TAB de PEF, avec une dizaine de retours d’experts, disponibles)Cas du méthane biogénique issu des retenues des barrages dans les zones équatoriales : Comptabilisé ou non selon les sources.Et pourtant, physiquement, « un rejet de CO2 dans l’atmosphère contribue à l’augmentation de la quantité de CO2 dans l’atmosphère, quelle que soit l’origine du C de la molécule de CO2 ».