Essential Information
As a sustainability expert, you are often confronted with controversial questions about the environmental impact of decisions in your job. In this module, you will gain in-depth insight into the comprehensive assessment of environmental impacts over the entire life cycle of a product or service.
By applying life cycle thinking to a specific case study, you will learn to systematically analyse environmental impacts and promote sustainable, science-based decision-making in various sectors of the economy. In the end, you will be able to quantitatively assess the environmental sustainability of products and design innovative solutions for a sustainable future.
Module Contents
Life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology
- LCA as a central instrument of product sustainability assessment
- Goal and scope, life cycle inventory, impact assessment, interpretation
- Environmental footprint, carbon footprint, Ecological Scarcity Method, cumulative energy demand
LCA in use
- LCA for everyday life
- Eco-sin game
- Environmental product declarations based on LCA
- My personal footprint
Applying the life cycle assessment methodology to your own case study
- Questionnaire design and data collection
- Modelling with LCA software and databases
- Quantification of the environmental footprint of products, identification of ecological hotspots and trade-offs
- Recommendations and ecological optimisation of products and processes
Study Information
The language of instruction is English.