Expanding the coverage of ecosystem services in life cycle assessment: an interdisciplinary venture

To contribute to the body of knowledge aiming at a better coverage of ecosystem service assessment in LCA studies, this thesis dives into the challenges of incorporating existing ecosystem service methods within the impact assessment phase of the conventional LCA framework. Through this thesis, we present an overview of ecosystem service categories that could represent an optimal coverage for their inclusion in LCA, and provide a clear example on how to overcome the challenges of characterizing key environmental impacts that are otherwise missing or misrepresented in LCA results and that influence the quality and supply of ecosystem services. We demonstrate the approach proposed with the development of readily applicable CFs that will allow future LCA studies to account for land use impacts on pollinator abundance, and provide further evidence on the benefits of interdisciplinary collaboration as a way to strengthen our capacity to estimate anthropogenic impacts, with the use of expert elicitation methods as a valuable tool to fill in key data gaps. Lastly, we recommend to continue efforts towards an overarching archetype classification that can facilitate the inclusion of multiple biogeographical and socio-economic factors for the identification of representative patterns, and provide input across multiple impact categories at relevant spatial scales.Conservation Biolog

Towards an optimal coverage of ecosystem services in LCA

Our society relies on the sustained provisioning of ecosystem services (ES), while such provisioning has been negatively affected by human activities. Recently, several authors proposed indicators for the assessment of ES in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) studies and developed corresponding characterization factors for integration in the impact assessment phase of LCA (LCIA). However, the vast majority of these indicators are still not operational and not a single study has presented a comprehensive list of ES for inclusion in LCIA. As a result, the individual efforts to incorporate ES in LCIA lack guidance from a framework to comprehensively assess and prioritize ES for inclusion in LCIA. This study addresses the aforementioned knowledge gap, and presents an original framework for the optimal coverage of ES in LCIA. We first identify, describe and visualize ecosystem services assessed currently (directly and indirectly) included in the widely applied LCIA method ReCiPe2016. Next, we propose an optimal coverage of ES in LCIA consisting of 15 categories of ES, including provisioning, regulation and maintenance, and cultural services, derived from the ES classification method CICES V5.1. Next, we identify the gap between the current and optimal coverage, consisting of 11 ES categories currently not covered by ReCiPe2016. As a proposal to help accelerate the incorporation of missing ES, we finally prioritize missing categories using available monetary valuation data, resulting in a ranking of ES categories to be included in LCIA. The four categories that rank highest are “Regulation of flows and protection from extreme events”, “Mediations of wastes, toxics and nuisances”, “Water conditions” and “Aesthetic value”. Our analysis and prioritization helps setting a research agenda for the scientific community to collaboratively and comprehensively incorporate missing ES categories in LCIA.Environmental Biolog

Linking land use inventories to biodiversity impact assessment methods

There is generally a mismatch in the land use classification of life cycle inventory (LCI) databases and life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) methods. This mismatch can hinder the proper assessment of land use impacts on biodiversity. To facilitate such assessments, we matched the land use classes of two global LCIA methods to five widely used LCI databases, one LCI nomenclature, and one multi-regional input-output database. In unclear cases, we assumed the worst case. Assumptions were especially necessary for unspecified land use intensity classes. We conclude with recommendations for LCI database and LCIA method developers.Industrial Ecolog

Characterization factors to assess land use impacts on pollinator abundance in life cycle assessment

While wild pollinators play a key role in global food production, their assessment is currently missing from the most commonly used environmental impact assessment method, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). This is mainly due to constraints in data availability and compatibility with LCA inventories. To target this gap, relative pollinator abundance estimates were obtained with the use of a Delphi assessment, during which 25 experts, covering 16 nationalities and 45 countries of expertise, provided scores for low, typical, and high expected abundance associated with 24 land use categories. Based on these estimates, this study presents a set of globally generic characterization factors (CFs) that allows translating land use into relative impacts to wild pollinator abundance. The associated uncertainty of the CFs is presented along with an illustrative case to demonstrate the applicability in LCA studies. The CFs based on estimates that reached consensus during the Delphi assessment are recommended as readily applicable and allow key differences among land use types to be distinguished. The resulting CFs are proposed as the first step for incorporating pollinator impacts in LCA studies, exemplifying the use of expert elicitation methods as a useful tool to fill data gaps that constrain the characterization of key environmental impacts.Industrial EcologyEnvironmental Biolog

Assessing the use of land system archetypes to increase regional variability representation in characterisation factors: a soil erosion case study

Purpose The characterization of land use impacts in life cycle assessment (LCA) requires a constant compromise between highly specific impacts models and coarse geographical scales available in life cycle inventory, where most information is provided at country level as the highest degree of geographical specificity. The derivation of country-specific characterization factors is usually done estimating impacts with the use of land cover and potential natural vegetation maps, assuming the most predominant biome per country as representative. This study explores the use of land system archetypes to derive country-specific characterization factors for land use-related soil erosion impacts that can better represent intra-national variations, while accounting for several biogeographical and socioeconomic differences. Methods Land use-specific characterization factors were derived as the potentially enhanced soil erosion rate, using the soil erosion rates of each archetype as a reference state, and correction factors to reflect the relative increase or decrease in soil erosion rates associated with each of the eight land use types assessed: forest, permanent crops, grassland, farmland, fallow ground, moorland, urban/industrial, and mining/landfill. Country-specific characterization factors for land use erosion impacts of occupation (in ton/(m2·year)) were calculated by taking into account the land system archetypes present in each country, the land use-specific characterization factors, and the likelihood of each land use type occurring across archetypes (based on rule of thumb expert estimates). The country-specific characterization factors were produced specifically for occupation impacts for each of the eight land use types, and covering 263 countries and territories/dependencies. Results and discussion The resulting 2,104 country-specific characterization factors displayed in average a considerably greater variation in comparison with characterization factors produced when only the most predominant archetype per country is assumed as representative per country. The results indicate that world generic values might underestimate up to 10 times the degree of impacts associated with land use types such as permanent crops, fallow ground, mining, and landfill. The use of land system archetypes presents a viable approach to derive country-specific characterization factors while taking into account key intra-national variations, as well as biogeographical and socioeconomic factors.</p

Characterization Factors to Assess Land Use Impacts on Pollinator Abundance in Life Cycle Assessment

While wild pollinators play a key role in global food production, their assessment is currently missing from the most commonly used environmental impact assessment method, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). This is mainly due to constraints in data availability and compatibility with LCA inventories. To target this gap, relative pollinator abundance estimates were obtained with the use of a Delphi assessment, during which 25 experts, covering 16 nationalities and 45 countries of expertise, provided scores for low, typical, and high expected abundance associated with 24 land use categories. Based on these estimates, this study presents a set of globally generic characterization factors (CFs) that allows translating land use into relative impacts to wild pollinator abundance. The associated uncertainty of the CFs is presented along with an illustrative case to demonstrate the applicability in LCA studies. The CFs based on estimates that reached consensus during the Delphi assessment are recommended as readily applicable and allow key differences among land use types to be distinguished. The resulting CFs are proposed as the first step for incorporating pollinator impacts in LCA studies, exemplifying the use of expert elicitation methods as a useful tool to fill data gaps that constrain the characterization of key environmental impacts