Procurement Policy Changes Using LCA, 1996 Life Cycle Assessment Symposium Proceedings

Mandy Moore

Environmental Issues & Communications

Scott Limited, a consumer product market leader in the U.K., was faced with environmental concerns impacting consumer purchasing decisions. They did not know how to measure overall life-cycle environmental performance, but felt that consumers needed some type of indicator of performance to integrate their purchasing decision with the other dimensions of cost, quality, and service. Scott Ltd. performed a preliminary analysis showing that significant environmental “impacts” were “bought-in” from suppliers. Scott concluded that there was opportunity for significant improvement of a product’s “environmental attributes” for limited costs by modifying its procurement policy. They also evaluated internal improvement options to a limited extent. Scott chose to use LCA inventory techniques to help in their procurement policy determinations (see paper by Bert Yaros in this symposium for more information). LCA, however, at that time and date, does not have an effective method for determining the “value” of various environmental impacts. In order to be able to get the process moving, Scott conducted telephone research with key opinion former groups across Europe to determine the priority ranking of environmental issues. This process was refined by the development of a “first principles” opinion former research strategy that incorporated traditional market research with expert panels in a decision analysis technique to determine what were the “key” environmental parameters that needed to be included in the measure of overall performance. As a result, they found that who you buy from can be more important than what you buy, and environmental performance can be built into purchasing criteria alongside quality, price, and delivery. As a result of this work (1) Scott set up minimum standards for their pulp suppliers; (2) the worst 10% of suppliers were dropped from the supply list and those with the best environmental performance were given preference without adding cost; (3) Scott was able to make consumer claims which could be substantiated. LCA was a useful tool that helped Scott Ltd. understand and measure overall environmental performance but the results were very product specific and the assessment should work with suppliers as a highly subjective, value process. This process had to be developed outside of the current LCA framework. Finally, the overall process is somewhat incomplete with the inclusion of “soft issues” such as those found in forestry.