GSOE9340 – Life Cycle Engineering

GSOE9340 – Life Cycle Engineering

Assignment Two - Term 2-2024

Assignment weight: 30%

Purpose: The purpose of this assignment is to develop an understanding of the second step of operationalizing  the  framework  of  LCE,  which  is  the  Planetary  boundaries  Life  Cycle Environmental Impact Assessment (Pb-LCA) of a representative product for the organisation you have used in Assignment 1. This will increase your familiarity with how the environmental impact and the absolute sustainability assessment are assessed and measured. As a result of completing this assignment, you will be able to determine reference flow, input-output relations between processes, background and  foreground processes, goal  and  scope definition,  and environmental hotspots along the product life cycle, absolute sustainability assessment.

Task: The assignment will require week 1, 2 and 3 lectures. Therefore, you should attempt the following tasks by using these lecture materials. In this assignment, you will use the product you have identified, some of the results you have estimated in Assignment 1. It is expected that you will search the internet for a relevant publication, which details the environmental impact evaluation (LCA) of the selected product. You may search journals such as International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, Journal of Industry Ecology, Journal of Cleaner Production, etc. As part of the submission, you must provide the article details in your submission. If you have already involved in a life cycle assessment (LCA) of a product in the past, you may use the results with proper documentation as evidence. By using the information gathered:

1.   Demonstrate the product lifecycle, the reference flow, and the process flow and their Input- outputs relation between processes as extracted from the literature. By using this, clearly explain the scope of the study, and map foreground and background processes along to the product life cycle (5 points).

2.   Based on the environmental impact assessment reference you have found, and the information gathered in the previous steps (5 points):

a.   Clearly detail the goal and scope of the study,

b.   Functional unit,

c.   Impact categories,

d.   System boundaries,

e.   Inventory analysis,

f.   Impact assessment methodologies used,

g.   Environmental impact databases used.

3.   Provide a critical review of the information provided in questions 1 and 2 with respect to ISO14040 and ISO14044 (10 points).

4.   Identify  environmental  impacts  (EI)  and  environmental  hotspots  and provide relevant figures and charts to show the environmental hotspots (You must make sure that the study includes the  CO2eq   footprint  to use  for  further  analysis),  and  the  total  environmental footprint in terms of CO2eq.

a.   Then compare this with the SoS of the product with and without volume growth that you have estimated in Assignment 1 and present it in a graphical format with an emission variability range. It is certain that the CO2eq  footprint estimated in this assignment will differ from the estimated SoS values. Clearly explain the possible cause of this (5 points).

b.   Estimate the Absolute Sustainability Ratio (ASR) and the ASR range on a graph and discuss the results (5 points).

Note:

.   You may make assumptions if you need one after clearly stating them.

.   All tasks are not equal value.

Assessment Criteria:

.   Clearly providing and citing the used references.

.   Demonstrating the selected product life cycle, the reference flow, and the process flow and their Input-outputs relation between processes.

.    Showing foreground and background processes along to the product life cycle.

.   Clearly explaining the goal and scope of the study, Functional unit, Impact categories, System boundaries, Inventory analysis,    Impact assessment methodologies   used, Environmental impact databases used.

.   Critical review these with respect to the ISO14040 and ISO14044

.    Showing environmental impact and providing relevant figures and charts to show the environmental hotspots.

.   In each step, clearly showing the calculations, if any, and explaining your thought process.