CIRCULAR ECONOMY & POLICIES:

FUNDAMENTALS & APPLICATIONS IN

THE ENERGY SECTOR

The Energy Club | Parv & IIT Bombay

Ruchir
 WEEK 1
DAY 4
LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT FOR
THE CIRCULAR ECONOMY
The Energy Club IIT Bombay
 INTRODUCTION
Life Cycle Assessment, also known as Life Cycle Analysis, (LCA) is a process for
evaluating the environmental impacts of a product or service over the course of its
entire life. It is often used to determine the best performing product, service, or
other solution, at a given point in time, in terms of specific environmental impacts,
such as carbon emissions.
However, like any tool, it has its limitations, and can give misleading or
contradictory outcomes if not used carefully.
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circular-economy

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 THE MAIN PHASES OF LIFE CYCLE
ASSESSMENT

GOAL & SCOPE DEFINITION INVENTORY ANALYSIS

IMPACT ASSESSMENT INTERPRETATION

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 GOAL AND SCOPE
DEFINITION
In this phase, you define the product or service that you wish to
assess, you choose a functional basis for comparison and you
define the required level of detail. You then set a goal which
determines the scope , including objective, application and
audience. Lastly, you determine whether or not there has to be
a critical review of that goal.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 INVENTORY ANALYSIS

Here you perform a data compilation and an inventory

analysis of extractions from and releases into the
environment. The final inventory provides a list of all inputs
and outputs associated with the
life cycle of your product or service.

Further Reading:
https://sphera.com/product-sustainability-software/

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 IMPACT ASSESSMENT

In impact assessment, you classify resource use and

emissions generated according to their potential
impacts and quantify them for a limited number of
impact categories, which you may then assess in
terms of their relative importance for the goal of the
LCA study.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 INTERPRETATION

With the above information, you discuss the results in terms of

contributions, relevance, robustness, data quality and limitations,
and you systematically evaluate any opportunities for reducing the
negative effects of the product(s) or service(s) on the environment
while avoiding burden shifting between impact categories or life
cycle phases. Avoiding burden shifting is a core strength of the LCA
approach.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 Flow Diagram describing the Application of LCA
Analysis
to a Fast-Fashion Retail Product
Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 IMPACT CATEGORIES IN
LCA ANALYSIS
CLIMATE CHANGE EUTROPHICATION
ACIDIFICATION SMOG FORMATION
OZONE DEPLETION PARTICULATE MATTER

For more detail:

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ca/

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 REASONS TO BE CAUTIOUS
WITH LIFE CYCLE ANALYSIS

FAVOURS
IGNORES
RELIES ON SHORT TERM
HARD TO
ASSUMPTIONS GAIN OVER
MEASURE
SYSTEMATIC
IMPACTS
CHANGE

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 FAVOURS SHORT TERM GAIN
OVER SYSTEMATIC CHANGE
When thinking about a circular economy transition, it is important to remember
that while Life Cycle Assessment is good at pointing to the best option based on a
specific metric at a specific time, it can sometimes lead us to seek short term,
individual benefits at the expense of long term, collective ones.
A well known example of this is electric vehicles (EVs). LCAs in the past have
pointed to the immediate benefit of improving the efficiencies of petrol cars,
rather than innovating EV technology and developing renewable energy
production. In these cases, the LCA pointed towards a quick fix based on the
reality of the current system, rather than systemic change. For a circular
economy, we need systemic change.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 IGNORES HARD TO
MEASURE IMPACTS
Life Cycle Analysis can only measure metrics that we can quantify, such as
carbon emissions, and therefore weighs decisions more heavily towards
these metrics. LCA can often ignore impacts that are harder to measure or
less well understood, such as plastic in the environment or the long term
effects of landfill runoff. For example, LCA can have a hard time assessing
the environmental benefits of reuse models for plastic packaging compared
to sending single-use plastic to landfill, given that from a carbon perspective,
landfill can be viewed as a form of ‘carbon storage’.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 MEASURES ONLY WHAT IS TOLD
AND RELIES ON ASSUMPTIONS
Life Cycle Assessments are also limited in the sense that they will only
measure the parts of the system or the metrics that you have asked them to
look at. Anything that isn’t defined within the boundaries of the LCA will not
be accounted for. On top of all that, LCAs, just like all models, are dependent
on the data you feed into them and the assumptions you make. There are
many examples of different studies looking at the same question but
arriving at different conclusions because of different data sources, system
boundaries and assumptions. The authors of the LCA, reliability of the data,
availability of the data, etc. should always be taken into account when
interpreting the results.
Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 USING LCA FOR A
CIRCULAR ECONOMY TRANSITION
In order to successfully use LCA to support and inform the
transition to a circular economy, it is important to be mindful of
its limitations and use it as one tool among many, and not as a
single source of truth. Rather than simply optimising individually
in today’s system, we need to envisage the target state we want
to achieve — a circular economy — and start innovating towards
it. There are a number of ways LCA can be used to support this as
described in the upcoming slides.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 Circular v/s Linear Economy in Crop Production
The Picture also designates functions for LCA Analysis

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 HIGHLIGHT AREAS OF
IMPROVEMENT

Life Cycle Analysis can be used to identify impact hotspots

within the life cycle of a specific solution – such as highlighting
the stage in a product’s life that is particularly resource
intensive or polluting – and then help assess how well different
options for that part of the lifecycle address those impacts.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 TEST AGAINST CHANGING
EXTERNAL FACTORS
Life Cycle Assessments can be used to investigate the
impact of external factors that might vary between
geographies or with time – for example, changes in the
energy mix, development of recycling infrastructure, or
deployment of a new technology. This can be done by
changing the input parameters of an LCA.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 COMPARE SIMILAR
SOLUTIONS
LCA is most likely to be able to give a clear answer when
most parts of the system remain the same. For example,
LCA could be used to compare the carbon emissions of
two different packaging material choices, when all other
parts of the business model are the same.

Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 USE LCA IN LATER
STAGES OF INNOVATION
An LCA is most useful when there is reliable input data and
fewer unknowns. Once it is clear how materials and
resources will flow through the system, an LCA can be more
effective. The later stages of an innovation process, such as
during scale up or when improving an existing system,
therefore might be the best time to carry out LCAs. Care
should be taken when using LCA in the early stages of an
innovation process.
Presentation by The Energy Club | Technical Summer School | 2024 | IIT Bombay
 THANK YOU

The Energy Club | Technical Summer IIT Bombay

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