Luigia Petti

Subcategory assessment method for social life cycle assessment. Part 1: methodological framework

PurposeThe aim of this work is to propose an objective method for evaluating subcategories in social life cycle impact assessment (S-LCIA). Methods for assessing subcategories have been available since 2006, but a number of these either fail to include all the subcategories envisaged in the guidelines for S-LCA (UNEP/SETAC 2009) or are subjective in their assessment of each subcategory.MethodsThe methodology is characterized by four steps: (i) the use of the organization as unit process, in which it was decided to assess the social profile of the organization responsible for the processes involved in the product life cycle, (ii) definition of the basic requirement to assess each subcategory, (iii) definition of levels based on the environment context or organizational practice and the data availability and (iv) assignment of a quantitative value.Results and discussionThe result of the method applied was the development of the subcategory assessment method (SAM). SAM is a characterization model that evaluates subcategories during the impact assessment phase. This method is based on the behaviour of organizations responsible for the processes along the product life cycle, thereby enabling a social performance evaluation. The method, thus, presents levels for each subcategory assessment. Level A indicates that the organization exhibits proactive behaviour by promoting basic requirement (BR) practices along the value chain. Level B means that the organization fulfils the BR. Levels C and D are assigned to organizations that do not meet the BR and are differentiated by their context. The greatest difficulty when developing SAM was the definition of the BR to be used in the evaluation of the subcategories, though many indications were present in the methodological sheets.ConclusionsSAM makes it possible to go from inventory to subcategory assessment. The method supports evaluation across life cycle products, thereby ensuring a more objective evaluation of the social behaviour of organizations and applicable in different countries.RecommendationsWhen using SAM, it is advisable to update the data for the context environment. The method might be improved by using data for the social context that would consider not only the country, but also the region, sector and product concerned. A further improvement could be a subdivision of the levels to better encompass differences between organizations. It is advisable to test SAM by applying it to a case study.

Systematic literature review in social life cycle assessment

PurposeThe main purpose of this review is to investigate the methodology of social life cycle assessment (SLCA) through its application to case studies. In addition, the following research aims to define the trends related to the SLCA by researchers and consultants. This study will help to map the current situation and to highlight the hot spots and weaknesses of the application of the SLCA theory.MethodsThe SLCA could be considered as a useful methodology to provide decision support in order to compare products and/or improve the social effects of the life cycle of a product. Furthermore, the results of the case studies analyzed may influence decision makers significantly. For this reason, a systematic literature review of case studies was carried out in which SLCA was applied in order to analyze closely the application of the stages of this methodology. In this study, the major phases of the technical framework for a SLCA were analyzed. Specific attention was paid to detect the positive impacts that emerged in the case studies, which were also studied by administering a questionnaire to the authors of the analyzed case studies and to a number of experts in the field of SLCA.Results and discussionThe 35 case studies examined in this paper, even though they do not deviate from the 40 identified by the previous processing, are still significantly different in terms of outcome produced. It is important to clarify that the authors who developed the case studies considered the steps defined in the SETAC/SETAC guidelines, borrowed from the ISO 14044 standard.ConclusionsThe data resulting from this analysis could help both practitioners and researchers to understand what the issues are, on which it is still necessary to investigate and work, in order to solidify the SLCA methodology and define its role in the context of life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA).

A newly developed integrated environment-quality approach for the design of hotel services

In the perspective of sustainability and industrial ecology, the need to dematerialise economies has become more important. As a consequence, the relative contribution of the service industries to the overall economic output is expected to increase. This entails a growing focus on service-related activities and their ability to meet consumer requirements and societys needs. Among the service industries, one that has become the object of an increased consumer interest is tourism. In this research work, we investigate the main aspects concerning the applicability of existing or newly developed integrated design tools to the above-mentioned service industry, with particular focus on lodging services. In particular, the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) design tool is taken into account and its integration with life cycle-based instruments for environmental assessment is proposed and evaluated with the aim of improving the level of customer satisfaction and the compliance with environmental requirements in lodging services.

The Implementation of Simplified LCA in Agri-Food SMEs

In Chap. 6 a simplified Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) tool that could be suitable for SMEs, especially in the food industry, was identified. In this Chapter, the selected tool (eVerdEE) was tested for its robustness and suitability, by implementing it to an Italian wine produced by a small winery. A full LCA was also carried out to evaluate in parallel the results of the two tools. Furthermore, the implementation of the simplified LCA tool aimed also to check whether it actually meets the criteria against which it was assessed for its selection. It was found that both tools showed fossil depletion and climate change as the impact categories with the highest normalised scores. Nevertheless, no safe considerations could be drawn with regard to which phase contributed more, as different stages contributed differently to the various impact categories. Finally, some general considerations regarding strengths and weaknesses of the implementation of LCA in SMEs were outlined, especially as regards data collection.

Ecodesign for services: an innovative comprehensive method

Service organisations, as well as manufacturing ones, may be responsible for significant negative environmental impacts. To minimise them and to aim to those market segments that are sensitive to environmental issues, service organisations could improve the environmental soundness of their services through the integration of environmental issues in the design processes. In an attempt to meet these needs, the authors have developed an innovative model based on quality function deployment (QFD) which could support environmentally conscious design of services. This paper aims to illustrate the framework of the proposed model, and to analyse its strengths and weaknesses to identify research perspectives.

An Italian tomato “Cuore di Bue” case study: challenges and benefits using subcategory assessment method for social life cycle assessment

PurposeThe main purpose of this study is to present an implementation of the subcategory assessment method (SAM) to the life cycle of an Italian variety of tomato called “Cuore di Bue” produced by an Italian cooperative. The case study was used to use the methodology proposed in compliance with the guidelines of social life cycle assessment (S-LCA) in order to highlight issues for the improvement of SAM. A summary of strengths and weaknesses of the methodology as well as the social performance of the considered Italian tomato is an important result of this case study.MethodsThe methodology used is based on SAM. The UNEP/SETAC guidelines of S-LCA and the complementary methodological sheets were used as main references to carry out SAM, and it was used to assess the social performances of Cuore di Bue. The focus was on the assessment of the following three out of five stakeholder groups presented in the guidelines: workers, local community and consumers. Specific questionnaires have been developed to collect the inventory data related to each stakeholder group and along the product life cycle.Results and discussionSAM of Cuore di Bue showed a range of values, between 2 and 3 (C-B) for consumer stakeholder group and mainly 3 (B) for the local community and worker stakeholders. Because the best performance (A) is related to a numerical value of 4, better performances were not identified, owing to no propagation of actions in the value chain. The collective bargaining, transparency, feedback mechanism and privacy are the subcategories with the worst performance, but at the same time with more potential for improvements.ConclusionsThe implementation of SAM on Cuore di Bue allowed us to demonstrate how SAM transforms qualitative data into semi-quantitative information through a score scale that can help a decision maker achieve a product overview. SAM has been implemented on Cuore di Bue; the product assessment, the strengths and weaknesses of the methodology are identified and discussed as well. It has been possible to present the best and worst performances in product life cycle, by identifying the phase or the subcategories with good or bad performance. However, in this case study, as the same company owns most of the product life cycle taken into account, the majority of social performances are identical, and this may represent a limit of the methodology or that more organisations along the life cycle must be taken into account (for example, energy, distribution).

Life Cycle Assessment in the Wine Sector

Currently, stakeholders’ increasing attention to quality is driving the wine sector to rethink and change its own production processes. Amongst product quality dimensions, the environment is gaining ever-growing attention at various levels of policy-making and business. Given its soundness, the use of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has become widespread in many application contexts. Apart from applications for communication purposes, LCA has also been used in the wine sector to highlight environmental hot spots in supply chains, to compare farming practices and to detect improvement options, inter alia. Case studies whose focus is the wine industry abound in high quality publications.

A Model of Simplified LCA for Agri-Food SMEs

This Chapter describes and discusses the approach for identifying a simplified life cycle assessment (LCA) model suited for SMEs in the agri-food sector, addressing both the supply (developments of methods and tools) and demand (what stakeholders desire from a life cycle tool) side of the simplification problem. As far as the demand side is concerned, building on the results of the analysis carried out in Chap. 5, a literature review was carried out, aimed at identifying and characterising already existing simplified approaches and tools. On the supply side, the results of the review were crosschecked with the main outcomes of a survey about the need for simplification, the stakeholders of interest and their needs. This allowed the identification of some criteria for identifying the suitable simplified tool, which was subsequently selected by applying decision making methodologies belonging to the family of Multi-Attribute Utility Theory. This process resulted in the choice of eVerdEE. The validation of this choice is described in Chap. 7, through the application of this tool to a case study and its parallel analysis with the results of a detailed LCA.

Life cycle assessment in the framework of sustainable tourism: a preliminary examination of its effectiveness and challenges

The environmental sustainability of tourism has been increasingly appearing in Local Agenda 21 and in the development policies of many countries. Although several studies have focused on sustainable tourism, only a few of them are based on life cycle assessment (LCA), the main methodology to assess environmental issues from a life cycle perspective. In order to gain a better understanding of the limited application of LCA in the tourism sector, the authors have critically reviewed the international literature and have carried out a case study on an Italian hotel. In this paper, results of such an implementation are concisely presented. From this study, key points for LCA development are envisaged, and the role of LCA in the framework of sustainable tourism is analysed.

Service/Product Engineering as a potential approach to value enhancement in supply chains

Beginning with a historical analysis of the application of value chain models in production systems, this paper highlights the issue of efficiency in conventional design and providing products and ...