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Prospective Characterization Factors for Assessing Climate Change Impacts in Life Cycle Assessments
Marcos D Barbosa Watanabe1, Francesco Cherubini1
1Industrial Ecology Programme, Department of Energy and Process Engineering, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Trondheim 7034, Norway.
This study introduces prospective characterization factors (pCFs) for future climate impact assessments in life cycle analysis. These new factors improve the accuracy of environmental impact evaluations for future emissions and technologies.
Area of Science:
- Environmental Science
- Climate Change Assessment
- Life Cycle Assessment
Background:
- Prospective life cycle assessment (pLCA) evaluates future environmental impacts but lacks consistent prospective characterization factors (pCFs).
- Existing pCFs hinder accurate assessment of future emissions and alignment between inventory and impact phases.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop consistent prospective characterization factors (pCFs) for climate impact assessment in pLCA.
- To integrate future emission scenarios from Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs) with gas-specific climate parameters.
Main Methods:
- Computed prospective Global Warming Potential (pGWP) and Global Temperature change Potential (pGTP) for emissions up to 2050.
- Integrated gas-specific climate parameters with IAM emission scenarios.
- Calculated pCFs for various gases (CH4, N2O) and applied them to specific activities and sectors.
Main Results:
- Methane pGWP100 varied by -8% to +23%, and nitrous oxide by -17% to +7% compared to present-day factors.
- CH4 pGTP100 shifted by -24% to +22%, and N2O pGTP100 by -27% to +8%.
- Impacts decreased significantly in sectors like steel (-44%), road transport (-58%), and cement (-31%) when using pGTP100 with prospective inventories.
Conclusions:
- The developed pCFs enable consistent coupling of impact assessment with future-oriented inventory data in pLCA.
- This improves the robustness and coherence of prospective life cycle assessments.
- The study provides crucial tools for more accurate future environmental impact evaluations.
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