Abstract
Recently increasing attention has been paid to complementing environmental Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) with social aspects. The paper discusses the selection of social impacts and indicators from existing frameworks like Social Life Cycle Assessment (SLCA) and Social Impact Assessment (SIA). Two ongoing case studies, addressing sustainability assessment within decision support, were considered: (1) Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) in Indonesia; and (2) Integrated Packaging Waste Management in Spain and Portugal (FENIX). The focus was put on social impacts occurring due to decisions within these systems, such as choice of technologies, practices or suppliers. Thus, decision makers—here understood as intended users of the studies’ results—are not consumers that buy (or do not buy) a product, such as in recent SLCA case-studies, but mainly institutions that decide about the design of the water or packaging waste management system. Therefore, in the FENIX project, a list of social impacts identified from literature was sent to the intended users to be ranked according to their priorities. Finally, the paper discusses to what extent the entire life cycle is reflected in SLCA impact categories and indicators, and explains how both life-cycle and on-site-related social impacts were chosen to be assessed. However, not all indicators in the two projects will assess all stages of the life cycle, because of their varying relevance in the different stages, data availability and practical interest of decision makers.
Highlights
Social SustainabilityThe term sustainability and the question of how to achieve a sustainable development have been discussed in literature since the late 1970s
Cycle Assessment (SLCA) methodology, which intends to analyze the social impacts of a product, trying to avoid problem shifting among the different life cycle stages
The present study examines Social Life Cycle Assessment (SLCA) as a complementary method to Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), Life Cycle Costing (LCC) and HGF for integrating social aspects for technology assessment with a life cycle based and product/process related perspective
Summary
The term sustainability and the question of how to achieve a sustainable development have been discussed in literature since the late 1970s. With regard to social sustainability, the intergenerational equity concept is complemented by the idea of intragenerational equity (e.g., [2,4]), addressing the well-being of future, and of current, generations. Cycle Assessment (SLCA) methodology, which intends to analyze the social impacts of a product, trying to avoid problem shifting among the different life cycle stages. SIA and SLCA are complementary tools, focusing on different scopes and objects of investigation. Both tools have been developed as ‘social’ complements to the environmental assessment tools, e.g., EIA and Life Cycle. The main difference between SIA and SLCA (such as between EIA and LCA) is the focus of the study. While SIA focuses on on-site specific impacts, SLCA considers the entire life cycle of products and mainly global impacts. SLCA [7] and are not explicitly addressed here
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