Life cycle inventory library for embodied emissions in ventilation components

Abstract

Technical components are generally poorly described in environmental assessments of buildings. In this work, an extensive library of life cycle inventories for generic ventilation components and dimensions have been developed and documented. Components are described as unit processes and can be used to improve the understanding and coverage of ventilation systems in environmental assessment of buildings, and as potential building blocks for optimization of ventilation system design with minimum life cycle emissions. The ventilation components library has been tested on a modern and energy-efficient office building. Results show that more than 78 % of the climate footprint was covered directly by the library, while the main part of the remaining footprint was associated with non-standardized and building specific components. The coverage was even higher for other environmental impact categories. To assess the coverage of the library and estimate the full impacts for a complete ventilation system, inventories were developed also for the building specific components. Results from this showed an estimated total weight of 6.84 kg/m2 floor area, and a climate footprint of 22.7 kg CO2-eq./m2 floor area. Air handling units and circular ductwork were by far the top contributors with a combined 55 % of climate emissions, with roughly equal shares from both.