Model scenario for integrated environmental product assessment at the use of raw materials stage of a product

Abstract

In order to compensate for the weaknesses of existing environmental product assessment tools, this paper proposes a new model developed by integrating the most salient features of the existing tools. This integrated model is intended for electrical and electronics products regulated under the European Directives WEEE, RoHS and EuP. This paper briefly describes the weaknesses of the existing environmental product assessment tools and the framework of the integrated model. Since the use of raw materials comes in the first stage in the product life cycle, the integrated environmental product assessment model described in this paper focused on the use of raw material stage. A vacuum cleaner was used to demonstrate the main concepts involved in using the integrated model to assess the environmental performance of the product.