Before You Search for the Answer, Be Sure You Understand the Question: Some Thoughts and Cautions on the Use of Life Cycle Assessment, 1996 Life Cycle Assessment Symposium Proceedings

Reid Miner

NCASI

NCASI, in its role as the forest products industry’s environmental research organization, has assisted in several life cycle inventory (LCI) studies of forest products. In the process, it has become clear that there a number of issues that sometimes receive inadequate attention at companies contemplating LCI studies. The purpose of this paper is to alert forest products companies to these issues so that they can be considered in future studies. It is impossible to overemphasize the importance of well defined objectives. A company must be honest with itself about its objectives and be able to clearly articulate them to LCI practitioners. If this step is given inadequate attention, it will not be possible to know how best to structure an LCI study or even whether LCI is an appropriate tool. There are, after all, a variety of tools for studying the environmental aspects of products and processes. These include, for instance, risk assessment, site audits, and field studies. Each has its role. The key is selecting the correct tool and using it to best advantage. After examining the available tools, companies should employ those that are most appropriate for the objectives. If tools other than or in addition to, LCI are appropriate, companies should not hesitate to employ them. In defining objectives, perhaps the first question that must be asked is whether the company is interested primarily in examining environmental issues related to its production facilities or in characterizing its product (or product system) from “cradle-to-grave.” Life cycle inventories are, of course, intended to perform the latter function. An LCI is not needed, or even appropriate, if the interest is limited to environmental or resource issues related to company facilities. Before starting an LCI study, a company also needs to decide whether the objectives will be satisfied by a listing of numeric values for environmental loads and resource requirements (the typical output of an LCI study). In some cases, this may be enough - for instance, where LCI data are used for benchmarking. On the other hand, some objectives require that the environmental significance of these numbers be addressed. Attempts to compare “environmental preferability,” for instance, are not possible unless the numeric output from an LCI study is examined in light of its environmental and human health significance. There is currently no scientific consensus on methods for converting LCI data into statements about potential environmental impacts. Life cycle assessment,