Environmental Project, 995 – Update on Impact Categories, Normalisation and Weighting in LCA - Selected EDIP97-data

Update on Impact Categories, Normalisation and Weighting in LCA

Preface

This report was prepared within the Danish LCA methodology and consensus creation project during the period from 1997 to 2003.

The report is one out of five technical reports to be published by the Danish Environmental Protection Agency and dealing with key issues in LCA. The reports were prepared as background literature for a number of guidelines on LCA, planned to be published by the Danish Environmental Protection Agency during the autumn of 2004 and spring 2005. The reports present the scientific discussions and documentation for recommendations offered by the guidelines. The reports and guidelines developed within the project are presented in the overview figure below.

A primary objective of the guidelines has been to provide advice and recommendations on key issues in LCA at a more detailed level than offered by general literature, like the ISO-standards, the EDIP reports, the Nordic LCA project and SETAC publications. The guidelines must be regarded as a supplement to and not a substitution for this general literature.

It is, however, important to note that the guidelines were developed during a consensus process involving in reality all major research institutions and consulting firms engaged in the LCA field in Denmark. The advice given in the guidelines may thus be considered to represent what is generally accepted as best practice today in the field of LCA in Denmark.

The development of the guidelines and the technical reports was initiated and supervised by the Danish EPA Ad Hoc Committee on LCA Methodology Issues 1997-2001. The research institutions and consulting firms engaged in the development and consensus process are:

COWI, Consulting Engineers and Planners (Project Management)

Institute for Product Development, the Technical University of Denmark

FORCE Technology

The Danish Technological Institute

Carl Bro

The Danish Building Research Institute

DHI - Water and Environment

Danish Toxicology Institute

Rambøll

ECONET

National Environmental Research Institute

Guidelines and technical reports prepared within the Danish LCA-methodology and consensusproject