Seeking opportunities to reduce life cycle impacts of consumer goods-An economy-wide assessment

To quantify the total life cycle environmental impacts of consumption, an economy-wide assessment of goods and services is conducted using the Economic Input-Output Life Cycle Assessment (EIO-LCA) model. This research includes an assessment of total ldquocradle to consumerrdquo impacts of consumption, utilization of US Environmental Protection Agencypsilas Tool for the Reduction and Assessment of Chemical and Other Environmental Impacts (TRACI) in the EIO-LCA model, and the use of new modeling techniques for sectoral contribution analysis and subtotal supply chain impact of tier-1 supplier analysis. The results show that power generation contributes to nearly one fifth of the total embodied energy and greenhouse gas equivalent emissions in manufactured goods; and for the services and other institutions sectors, its contributions are more than one third. Sectoral contribution analyses show that mining is a major contributor of cancer effects for manufactured goods. Displacing mining production through recycling can help reduce life cycle cancer effects of goods. Consumer purchases of waste management services are found to contribute to nearly a quarter of all cancer and non-cancer impacts in the entire economy, signaling the need for producer responsibility policy aimed to reduce toxic materials that eventually enter the waste stream. Subtotal supply chain analysis of packaging materials found that on an energy basis, there exist opportunities to expand the existing applications of deposit-refund programs on beverage containers to other goods. Agencies, companies, and industry groups can use sectoral and supplier contribution analyses to identify opportunities for reducing the life cycle impacts of their products.