Improving Decision Support with Anticipatory Life Cycle
Assessment
Alex Cano, Lise Lauren, Valentina Prado PhD, Thomas Seager PhD, Ben Wender PhDMS Graduate Student23 September 2015
LCA Accounts for Shifting of Burdens
Material &energy inputs
Emissions to air, water & soil
Raw Materials
Manufacturing
Product use
End of life
Recycling
Per Functional Unit
LCA Should Support Environmental Decisions
A-SiSingle-Si Multi-Si Ribbon-SiCdTe
15.3% 14.9% 13.7% 6.5% 11.7%
30 year operationEcoinvent 3 LCI Jungbluth et al 2012
ReCiPe Midpoint H Data Uncertainty – Pedigree Matrix
F.U: Production 1 MJ Slanted Roof Installation
www.openlca.org
Long Known that Inventory is too Complex for Decision Makers
Midpoint Impact Still too Complex ...Impact Category Unit a-Si CdTe Multi- Si Ribbon-Si Single-Si
Mean Mean Mean Mean MeanAgricultural land m2a 4.9E-4 6.9E-4 1.2E-3 1.0E-3 1.1E-3Climate change kg CO2 eq 1.6E-2 1.3E-2 1.9E-2 1.7E-2 2.2E-2
Fossil dep kg oil eq 4.1E-3 3.3E-3 5.0E-3 4.4E-3 5.8E-3
Freshwater ecotox kg 1,4-DB eq 7.3E-6 7.7E-6 9.4E-6 9.6E-6 9.5E-6
Freshwater eutroph kg P eq 1.7E-5 2.0E-5 1.8E-5 1.7E-5 1.9E-5
Human toxicity kg 1,4-DB eq 8.5E-3 1.1E-2 1.1E-2 1.1E-2 1.1E-2
Marine ecotox kg 1,4-DB eq 9.1E-5 1.1E-4 1.5E-4 1.6E-4 1.5E-4
Marine eutroph kg N eq 5.6E-6 6.2E-6 8.8E-6 8.8E-6 9.8E-6Natural land trans m2 2.4E-6 1.9E-6 2.8E-6 2.5E-6 3.0E-6
Ozone Dep kg CFC-11 eq 9.5E-10 9.6E-10 3.4E-9 3.36E-9 3.28E-9
Terrestrial ecotoxicity kg 1,4-DB eq 2.4E-6 3.0E-6 3.5E-5 3.9E-5 3.4E-5
Urban land occup m2a 1.9E-4 1.8E-4 2.1E-4 1.9E-4 2.3E-4Water Dep m3 8.9E-2 5.9E-2 3.1E-1 2.3E-1 2.9E-1
0
25
50
75
100
a-Si CdTe multi-Si ribbon-Si single-Si
Typical Software Outputs Present Tradeoffs but No Uncertainty
0.0E+005.0E-061.0E-051.5E-052.0E-052.5E-053.0E-053.5E-054.0E-054.5E-055.0E-05
a-Si CdTe multi-Si ribbon-Si single-Si
External Normalization Emphasizes Global Behavior Not the Decision Maker
Normalized Values - ReCiPe Europe
Tradeoff significance
Impact Decision
Discrete Stochastic
Stochastic Multi-Attribute Analysis (SMAA) Addresses these Challenges
SMAA-Tool Uses Same Data Plus Uncertainty
Impact Category Unit
a-Si CdTe Multi- Si Ribbon-Si Single-Si
Mean SD Mean SD Mean SD Mean SD Mean SD
Agricultural land m2a 4.9E-4 1.9E-4 6.9E-4 2.0E-4 1.2E-3 3.6E-4 1.0E-3 3.0E-4 1.1E-3 3.5E-4
Climate change kg CO2 eq 1.6E-2 4.1E-3 1.3E-2 2.5E-3 1.9E-2 4.0E-3 1.7E-2 3.6E-3 2.2E-2 4.8E-3
Fossil dep kg oil eq 4.1E-3 1.1E-3 3.3E-3 6.8E-4 5.0E-3 1.1E-3 4.4E-3 9.1E-4 5.8E-3 1.3E-3
Freshwater eutroph kg P eq 1.7E-5 1.0E-5 2.0E-5 2.1E-5 1.8E-5 1.0E-5 1.7E-5 1.1E-5 1.9E-5 1.2E-5
Marine ecotox kg 1,4-DB eq 9.1E-5 4.0E-5 1.1E-4 5.8E-5 1.5E-4 7.5E-5 1.6E-4 7.3E-5 1.5E-4 6.9E-5
Marine eutroph kg N eq 5.6E-6 1.5E-6 6.2E-6 1.6E-6 8.8E-6 2.1E-6 8.8E-6 2.1E-6 9.8E-6 2.3E-6
Metal Dep kg Fe eq 9.0E-3 2.5E-3 8.5E-3 2.1E-3 7.1E-3 1.9E-3 6.9E-3 1.9E-3 7.2E-3 2.0E-3
Ozone Dep kg CFC-11 eq 9.5E-10 3.2E-10 9.6E-10 2.9E-10 3.4E-9 9.28E-
10 3.36E-9 8.85E-10 3.28E-9 8.40E-
10
Water Dep m3 8.9E-2 2.6E-2 5.9E-2 1.4E-2 3.1E-1 8.8E-2 2.3E-1 5.7E-2 2.9E-1 7.7E-2
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.80
10
20
30
5
15
25
Compare1
Prob
abili
ty D
ensi
ty
Compare1a-Si CdTe multi-Si ribbon-Si single-Si
Water depletion (m3)Prob
abili
ty D
ensit
y
CdTe
A-Si
Ribbon-SiSingle-SiMulti-Si
0 100u20u 40u 60u 80u 120u 140u0
10K
20K
30K
40K
50K
60K
Compare1
Prob
abili
ty D
ensi
ty
Compare1a-Si CdTe multi-Si ribbon-Si single-Si
CdTeA-SiRibbon-SiSingle-Si
Multi-Si
0 10u 20u2u 4u 6u 8u 12u 14u 16u 18u 22u0
100K
200K
300K
50K
150K
250K
Compare1
Prob
abili
ty D
ensi
ty
Compare1a-Si CdTe multi-Si ribbon-Si single-Si
Marine Eutrophication kg N eq
A-SiCdTe
Multi-SiRibbon-Si
Single-Si
Impact Category Avg areaEq. 9
Top 2
1 Water depletion 0.26 CdTe / A-Si 2 Terrestrial ecotoxicity 0.37 A-Si / CdTe3 Marine eutrophication 0.40 A-Si / CdTe4 Ozone depletion 0.48 A-Si / CdTe
5 Agricultural land occupation 0.51 A-Si / CdTe
6 Photochemical oxidant 0.54 CdTe / A-Si7 Climate change 0.56 CdTe / A-Si8 Fossil depletion 0.57 CdTe / A-Si
9 Particulate matter formation 0.67 CdTe / A-Si
10 Terrestrial acidification 0.73 CdTe / A-Si11 Marine ecotoxicity 0.75 A-Si / CdTe
12 Metal depletion 0.78 Ribbon-Si / Single-Si
13 Freshwater ecotoxicity 0.79 A-Si / CdTe14 Urban land occupation 0.83 CdTe / A-Si15 Human toxicity 0.84 A-Si / CdTe
16 Natural land transformation 0.84 CdTe / A-Si
17 Ionising radiation 0.85 CdTe / A-Si18 Freshwater eutrophication 0.88 A-Si / Ribbon-Si
Prob
abili
ty D
ensit
yPr
obab
ility
Den
sity
Prado-Lopez et al 2014 JIE
Tradeoff significance
Freshwater Eutrophication kg P eq
Showing Impacts with Uncertainty Helps Assess Significance
Aggregating Midpoints into Single Environmental Indicator Simplifies Decision
CdTe60% first
A-Si40% first
Single - Si64% Last
Overall Environmental Preference
Best
SMAA-LCARanking Preference
• Questions/Comments• Funding– United States Army Corps of Engineers – Research and Coordination Network – Earth Shift Global
Thank you