What Is a Life Cycle Assessment?

Ever wondered how much impact your favourite product really has on the planet—from the moment its raw materials are pulled from the earth to the day it’s disposed of? That’s exactly what a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) uncovers. In simple terms, an LCA tracks every stage of a product’s life—its “cradle to grave”—and measures the environmental impact along the way.

Why Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs) Matter

Imagine you're developing takeaway packaging and want to minimise its environmental impact. You might choose compostable bioplastic over conventional plastic, thinking it's the better choice for the environment. But without an LCA, you wouldn’t know which one uses more land, water, and carbon emissions to produce - also which needs special process to break down that your customers don't have access to. LCAs help uncover these kinds of blind spots, guiding smarter design choices so that you can  reduce the environmental impact.

The Two types of Assessment

1. Carbon Footprint of Products (CFP)

   • Focus: Only greenhouse-gas emissions (CO₂e).

   • Why it’s great: Quick to calculate, easy to explain to customers.

   • Drawbacks: Narrow scope, covers only carbon emissions.

   • When to use: If your goal is a consumer-facing carbon label or a fast sanity check, start here.

   • Standard: ISO 14067.

2. Full Life Cycle Assessment

   • Focus: Everything from water use and human-health impacts to ecosystem damage.

   • Why it’s deeper: Gives you the full environmental picture, ideal for complex supply chains or B2B transparency.

   • Drawbacks: Cost and time.

   • When to Use: When you need to optimise materials, secure green certifications, or publish an Environmental Product Declaration (EPD).

   • Standards: ISO 14040 and ISO 14044.

Overcoming the Hurdles in producing an LCA

Feeling overwhelmed by creating an LCA? Here’s how to keep it manageable:

• Get the right data: As a rule of thumb, you need the site-specific energy, water and waste data from your company’s practices, as well as the specific transport modes. For raw materials, you can use generic data sets. Generally, you will use generic datasets to calculate things like ‘particulate’ emissions and impacts on human health, even if they occur in your production facility.

• Stick to standards: Stick to the relevant Product Category Rules (PCRs) where available, look for guidance from EPD international and Australasia

• Reliable databases: use globally recognised databases where feasible

• Tell the story: Use clear charts and summaries and communicate the results in ways people can understand.

How to complete a lifecycle assessment?

Depending on your requirements, there some simple and free calculators available, and more complex calculators:

• LCA Quick by Branz – excellent for buildings in New Zealand.

• OpenLCA – More complex, the software itself is free, but if you need your LCA to meet compliance standards, you’ll likely need access to the Ecoinvent database, which can cost around $10,000, plus ongoing annual update fees.

• If you want free databases there’s some great links here https://ghgprotocol.org/life-cycle-databases.

New Zealand has already introduced mandatory climate-related disclosures for around 200 large financial institutions and listed companies, making it, at the time, one of the first countries to do. 

Want to learn more?

We recently dove into the topic “What Is the Role of LCAs, Carbon Footprints and EPDs?” in an article for EBOSS. There, we talk about:

• CFPs vs LCAs vs EPD

• The benefits of EPDs for the construction sector

• Changing regulations

👉 Read the full EBOSS article to see how these tools can transform your business.

Summary

Life cycle assessments (LCAs) offer valuable insights into a product’s environmental impact.

There are generally two types: simpler ones that focus primarily on carbon emissions, and more comprehensive assessments that cover a wide range of impact categories like water use, toxicity, and resource depletion.

While LCAs are powerful tools, they can also be complex and time-consuming to complete. You can use free calculators for basic assessments, or purchase specialised databases and software for more detailed studies. In many cases, it might actually be more cost-effective to work with experts (like us 😉), especially when you consider the time and resources required to do it yourself.

Would you like to learn more about your product’s true impact? Get in touch with MyImprint’s environmental consultants, and let’s map out an LCA or carbon-footprint study tailored to your goals.

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