Evaluating the environmental sustainability of durable products through life cycle assessment. The case of domestic refrigerators

Abstract

Sustainability and durability are not always interchangeable concepts, especially for products that require many resources during their long use phases, like energy related products. In addition, the literature either focuses on how the product performances change over time or evaluates the convenience of durable goods. In this context, the present work presents a durability assessment from an environmental perspective. Unlikely the existing literature, it simultaneously compares the different methods that describe how the product performances may vary with time, specifically how the foam aging influences the yearly energy consumption of refrigerators and assess the durability from the environmental point of view under different circumstances. The primary outcomes highlight the need to introduce a more accurate description of product performances during their lifetime (i.e. aging of components) to obtain realistic results. Furthermore, this work enlightens the need to align the analytical report on the deterioration of refrigerators' components and provides alternative exemplifications to assess the environmental sustainability of durability. As far as the latter case is concerned, multiple products can take advantage of it and have durability considered from the environmental point of view.