Journal of Industrial Ecology · 2006 · 298 citations · 27 references
ManagementStrategic ManagementSustainability ManagementLife Cycle AssessmentSustainability ScienceSustainable DevelopmentEnvironmental SustainabilityLife Cycle ThinkingLifecycle AssessmentSustainability AssessmentSustainability StrategySustainable MaterialsAssessmentsConstraintsLife Cycle Assessment MethodologyLife Cycle Sustainability AssessmentProduct Life Cycle AssessmentStrategic Development PlansSustainability ObjectivesSystem Boundaries
Life‑cycle assessment is a rigorous tool for evaluating materials and products, yet it often omits a sustainability perspective and forces trade‑offs between depth and applicability. The authors aim to establish strategic life‑cycle management, a framework that guides material and product decisions by prioritizing sustainability and strategic relevance to reduce unnecessary assessments and uncover knowledge gaps. They apply the Natural Step framework, using backcasting from sustainability principles to inform analyses with sustainability and strategic criteria. Initial experience shows the approach complements existing tools, such as product development and LCA, by adding a sustainability lens.
Sustainable management of materials and products requires continuous evaluation of numerous complex social, ecological, and economic factors. A number of tools and methods are emerging to support this. One of the most rigorous is life‐cycle assessment (LCA). But LCAs often lack a sustainability perspective and bring about difficult trade‐offs between specificity and depth, on the one hand, and comprehension and applicability, on the other. This article applies a framework for strategic sustainable development (often referred to as The Natural Step (TNS) framework) based on backcasting from basic principles for sustainability. The aim is to foster a new general approach to the management of materials and products, here termed “strategic life‐cycle management”. This includes informing the overall analysis with aspects that are relevant to a basic perspective on (1) sustainability, and (2) strategy to arrive at sustainability. The resulting overview is expected to help avoid costly assessments of flows and practices that are not critical from a sustainability and/or strategic perspective and to help identify strategic gaps in knowledge or potential problems that need further assessment. Early experience indicates that the approach can complement some existing tools and concepts by informing them from a sustainability perspective‐for example, current product development and LCA tools.
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