Abstract
To establish a circular economy in society, it is crucial to incorporate life-cycle studies, such as life-cycle assessment (LCA), in the design process of products in order to mitigate the well-recognized problem of the design paradox. The aim of the study was to provide means in a structured way to highlight choice uncertainty present in LCA when used as decision support, as well as to mitigate subjective interpretations of the numerical results leading to arbitrary decisions. The study focused on choices available when defining the goal and scope of a life-cycle assessment. The suggested approach is intended to be used in the early design phases of complex products with high levels of uncertainty in the product life-cycle. To demonstrate and evaluate the approach, a life-cycle assessment was conducted of two design options for a specific building. In the case study two types of building frameworks were compared from an environmental perspective by calculating the global warming potential, eutrophication potential, acidification potential, stratospheric ozone depletion potential and photochemical oxidants creation potential. In the study, a procedure named the Decision Choices Procedure (DCP) was developed to improve LCA as an effective tool for decision support concerning design alternatives when less information is available. The advantages and drawbacks of the proposed approach are discussed to spur further improvements in the use of LCA as a decision-support tool.
Highlights
To establish a circular economy in society, it is crucial to incorporate life-cycle analysis (LCA) in the design process of products
Adding more choice or parameter uncertainties might affect the conclusions in the case study but not the evaluation of Decision Choices Procedure (DCP), which was the purpose of the case study
The decision regarding which design option to use is directly dependent on the decision rule for all impact categories combined
Summary
To establish a circular economy in society, it is crucial to incorporate life-cycle analysis (LCA) in the design process of products. The largest potential for improvement of a product is early in the design process when fewer design choices and parameters have been established. This leads to the well-recognized problem of the design paradox when conducting LCA in the design process [1,2]. In the design phase it is easy to make changes, but less information is available. Late in the process there is more information, but it is difficult to make changes [3]. There will be many uncertainties to manage when conducting LCA for use as a decision-support tool in the design process [4]
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