The project Consistent Standards for Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has been launched to address inconsistencies within existing LCA standards. By harmonizing these guidelines, the initiative aims to create more reliable and consistent frameworks that are easier to implement across industries.

“A product’s life cycle is complex, and LCA results depend heavily on how you calculate. While many standards and guidelines have been developed, including several ISO standards, they are often open to interpretation and sometimes even contradict each other,” says Tomas Ekvall, researcher, and project leader for the initiative.

To address these issues, the project focuses on identifying conflicts within ISO standards and between ISO and the widely used Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHGP). Through interviews with LCA specialists, case studies, and analysis of existing standards, the project aims to identify ambiguities and contradictions while proposing actionable solutions.

“We plan to develop recommendations that resolve these conflicts, with the goal of making the standards both clearer and more uniform,” says Tomas Ekvall.

Navigating complexity in standards

Two key challenges already identified by the project are how electricity production should be modelled, and how to allocate environmental impacts across products that share production processes.

“In forestry, for instance, timber, pulpwood, and fuel are all derived from the same production process. But how should the environmental load from this process be distributed among the different products? The answer depends on what standard you read,” says Tomas Ekvall.

Clearer standards for a sustainable transition

Harmonizing LCA standards would not only enhance the reliability of environmental assessments, but also make LCA and climate footprint calculations more effective tools in the sustainable transition of the industry.

“I expect that the project will provide increased knowledge about the standards and their application, both among us in the project and to a much broader audience. My aim is that we also produce a coherent message about possible improvements in the standards. By sharing our findings, we hope to influence the standardization of LCA both during the project and afterwards,” says Tomas Ekvall.

About the project

Consistent Standards for Life Cycle Assessment is a collaboration between Swedish Life Cycle Center at Chalmers University of Technology and TERRA, in partnership with Electrolux, SKF, Essity, Höganäs, Jernkontoret, and Boliden.

The project is funded by Net Zero Industry, a joint initiative by Vinnova, Formas and the Swedish Energy Agency, and runs from November 2024 until January 2026.

Curious to learn more?

Visit the project webpage

Contact

Project manager: Tomas Ekvall, terra@tomasekvall.se

Project coordinator: Yulia Liu, yulia.liu@chalmers.se