Life cycle assessments

Purpose of LCA’s

to assess the different stages in a product's life cycle, and its impact on the environment

4 stages of the LCA

Extracting and processing the raw materials, manufacturing and packaging your product, using your product, disposing of it.

How extracting raw materials impacts the environment

When we extract the raw materials from nature, we often directly damage the local environment (e.g. cutting down forests or digging mines)

How processing raw materials impacts the environment

processing the raw materials indirectly harms the environment because of the huge amount of energy required + pollutants released.

3 main problems when manufacturing packaging

Energy use and pollution (e.g. carbon monoxide and hydrogen chloride). Also, production of waste products as most of the time they are useless

2 things that the environmental risk of using a product depends on

How much damage it does during its lifetime (e.g. how polluting driving a car is), how long the product is used for

3 impacts of disposing a product on the environment

If we place the product in a landfill then it takes up space that could've been used for nature. Chemicals also may seep out into the surrounding eco-systems. If we burn the waste products, it will release pollutants and take up energy

Pulped definition

breaking wood up into small pieces and then soaking them

Advantages of plastic bags over paper bags

Produces less waste when manufacturing through fractional distillation, can be reused multiple times

Advantages of paper bags over plastic bags

Uses slightly less energy to produce as it has to be pulped, is biodegradable and non-toxic

2 limitations to LCA’s

Making products involves loads of different steps, so it is almost impossible to quantify them. They can also be easily manipulated to deliberately support a company.