Life cycle assessment

Life cycle assessment (LCA)
Is used to assess the environmental impact a product has over its whole lifetime.
They provide a way of comparing several alternative products to see which one causes least damage to the environment

Example
Comparing LCA of aluminium cans and plastic bottles will allow a drinks manufacturer to make an informed choice about what packaging to use

To carry out an LCA scientists measure the impact of:
Extracting the materials
Processing the raw materials
Manufacturing the product
How the product is used
How it’s transported
How the product is disposed of at the end of its life

Some aspects of the LCA are easy to quantify, e.g
Amounts of water, raw materials and energy used

Difficult to quantify e.g.
…