Method for integrating Land Use into Life-Cycle-Assessment (LCA)

The formation of the Working Group "Land use" by SETAC (Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry) and of the COST Action E9 Lv the European Community is the manifestation of the necessity to integrate the impact category "Land Use" in LCAs. The requisite Method should Permit the integration of different land use activities into the complex structures of process networks of LCAs and should be able to reflect the various land uses in a satisfactory manner. More than merely the quantification of area units is required, as the quality of the used land has to be integrated as well as the temporal variations in quality In this approach quality is described in terms of the performance of "natural" functions of the land before, during and after use. The quality of used land is subjected to variations in the course of time, i.e. the temporal relationships of functions should be represented. The modelled functions are erosion resistance, filtering and buffering, material transformation, rainwater drain-off, groundwater formation and groundwater protection, protection against immissions, stability and biotic output and should be adapted to the specifications of LCAs, i.e. description of different land uses within the life cycle of products, quantification via distinct and measurable parameters, characterisation of environmental effects and feasibility of data collation. Functions are quantified using measurable parameters e.g. granulation, cationic exchange capacity pH value, C/N value. Boundary conditions based on information on e.g. vegetation and land uses shall be integrated and maps and electronic databases used for background information. Wherever detailed information about investigated areas is available, it should be directly used in the model to improve the accuracy of the results. If only some derails about land uses are extant, assessments and estimates may be done based on key parameters and background information to obtain the most comprehensive possible idea of land use impacts. This would make it possible to assess the potential qualify of land which shall be related to output (functional unit) e.g. limestone as output of a quarry and timber as output of a forest. The dimension of land use is [(squaremeter . year quality difference)/ functional unit]. The objective of LCA is to identify potential environmental effects for the entire life cycle, making the evaluation of land use such as the supply of resources, manufacturing of products, use of products and recycling an important factor in impact assessment. Once a potential environmental problem within the process network has been identified, other tools may be used such as Risk Assessment or EIA or gee-ecological methods which are usually too time consuming and limited to local systems to be used in the analysis of global process networks.