Abstract
Methodology for evaluation of the environmental impacts of emissions, energy conservation and resource depletion in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) are reviewed in this paper.
Currently, the environmental impacts are evaluated by the classification, such as “Greenhouse effect” and “Ozone layer depletion”, and aggregation method, whose value are calculated by the product of the emissions volume/mass and the weighing factors. The weighing factors are presently estimated based on scientific knowledge as far as possible. In order to evaluate environmental impacts on the different classifications in the same unit, the method of the calculation of environmental costs has been the focus of attention recently. In the future, we should consider not only environmental costs caused by the emissions but also other costs such as resource depletion and energy conservation.
