Product Stewardship and Life Cycle Assessment

One of the tools that has been successfully used by many leading manufacturers to become effective product stewards is Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). This comprehensive, standardized analytical methodology can help a company develop an environmental ‘balance sheet’ for the environmental impacts of its products throughout the value chain. LCA is not just a data collection process. Rather, if fully integrated into a company’s environmental and product management system, LCA can be used to:

1. Help to secure market and competitive positions: a number of leading companies are using LCA effectively to position their products in a number of markets.
 

2. Answer customer’s requests for environmental and social information: Product stewardship is becoming a key issue in many countries, which is driving many purchasers to demand more information about how its suppliers manage their products.
 

3. Enhance a company’s public image: Effective environmental, health and safety programs are linked to good management.
 

4. Participating in green purchasing policies: Environmentally Preferable Purchasing schemes in the U.S. and elsewhere require that suppliers provide quantitative information on a company’s environmental profile.
 

5. Define R&D strategies and EMS Systems: The holistic focus can help refine a company’s environmental management system or even identify potential research targets.
 

6. Identify cost savings: In a number of instances, the big picture provided by life cycle management has helped firms identify a number of significant cost savings.