Life cycle assessment (LifeCycleAssessment, LCA) is a methodological tool used to assess the environmental impacts associated with all stages of the product life cycle, from raw material acquisition, production, use, recycling to the final disposal of the product (I. e. "from cradle to grave"). It can help individuals, businesses, organizations, or governments make internal decisions that inform broad policy making.
L CA Product Lifecycle Optimized Design for Reuse Part of the Criteria:
when repeated use (reuse) is considered in comparative life cycle assessment studies, the question of whether repeated use is realistic is usually not solved and needs to be assumed based on consumer behavior. If a cotton bag is required to be reused x times in order to achieve the equivalent environmental impact of a polyethylene plastic bag, how high is the X value? What is consumer behavior in this regard? What is different in different cultural environments? How do we influence people to use for so long (or longer)? And, can the product be reused so many times? If not, can you design a product with the least amount of material?
Continue with the shopping bag example-disposable polyethylene plastic bags are designed to "use the least amount of material to achieve the intended purpose". When retailers buy these products by the millions, every gram saved is a huge cost savings. However, reusable shopping bags (reusable bags) do not have this benefit point because consumers pay for them, not retailers. Using the least amount of material to produce an environmentally friendly bag that is suitable for repeated use for many years is not the driving force of the design.
In terms of land and marine garbage and microplastics, disposable plastic bags are a bad choice, but they are more environmentally friendly than paper bags and biodegradable shopping bags in terms of climate change and water eutrophication. For reusable shopping bags, if they are reused enough times, they will be more environmentally friendly than disposable plastic bags.
By carrying out life cycle assessment, it helps users to quantitatively analyze the potential impact of product input and output on the environment in the life cycle process, and cooperates with key upstream suppliers to fully master LCA basic theoretical knowledge and GaBi software operation skills, laying the foundation for the establishment of a green supply chain and helping to achieve the industry's carbon peak and carbon neutrality goals.