Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and its variants (EPDs, WLCA, CBAM...)
What Is CBAM? Meaning and Purpose Explained
What Is CBAM? Meaning and Purpose So, what is CBAM? CBAM stands for Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism. It is the EU system for putting a carbon price on…
About Below280’s LCA Work
We hope this guide has been useful. If you need practical support with LCA or environmental assessment, our team can help. No project is too big or small.…
Articles, Book Chapters and Conferences
Our Published LCA Research Below280 is a commercial consultancy, but much of our work also feeds into peer-reviewed research. Our team writes and co-authors…
Glossary
Core LCA & Environmental Assessment Acronym Full Term LCA Life Cycle Assessment EPD Environmental Product Declaration WLCA Whole Life Carbon Assessment CBAM…
EPDs in LEED and BREEAM: How They Work
EPDs earn credits in both LEED and BREEAM, but the systems use them differently. LEED counts individual products meeting specific criteria. BREEAM…
Choosing an EPD Programme Operator
Every EPD exists within a programme run by a programme operator. This isn’t optional infrastructure. Your choice of programme operator affects who recognises…
EPD Data Requirements: What You Need to Collect
Data availability determines whether creating an EPD is straightforward or frustratingly difficult. The Life Cycle Assessment underlying every EPD requires…
EPD Modules Explained: A1-A3, B, C and D
When you open an EPD, the first thing you’ll notice is how environmental impacts are organised into alphabetic modules rather than being presented as single…
EPD Verification: What to Expect
Independent verification distinguishes EPDs from self-declared environmental claims. ISO 14025 mandates that someone independent of the EPD developer must…
EPD vs Carbon Footprint vs LCA: What’s the Difference?
Environmental assessment terminology confuses people because the terms overlap. Life Cycle Assessment, carbon footprint, and Environmental Product Declaration…
How Much Does an EPD Cost?
This was tricky to write. We’re a consultancy, and we know EPD costs vary hugely depending on product complexity and supply chain. But it’s also one of the…
How to Get an EPD for Your Product: The Complete Process
Creating an EPD isn’t a single action. It’s a process involving data collection, LCA modelling, documentation, verification, and publication. Understanding…
How to Read an EPD
Opening an Environmental Product Declaration for the first time can be overwhelming. You’ll see tables of numbers with unfamiliar units, references to…
How to Spot a Quality EPD
Not all EPDs deserve equal trust. Some contain rigorous, verified data based on measured production processes. Others rely on generic estimates and outdated…
Understanding EPD Impact Categories (Beyond Carbon)
When you look at an EPD, you’ll see environmental impacts reported across multiple categories, not just carbon emissions. Climate change sits alongside…
What are Product Category Rules (PCRs)?
Product Category Rules are the specific methodological requirements that make EPDs within a product category comparable rather than just a collection of…
What is an EPD? Environmental Product Declarations Explained
An Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) is a standardised document that presents quantified environmental impact data for a product across its entire life…
What is Module D in an EPD?
Module D appears in every EPD but it sits apart from the other life cycle modules. While Modules A, B, and C sit inside the product system boundary tracking…
When Can You Compare EPDs? (And When You Can’t)
The promise of EPDs is comparability, but knowing when you can compare EPDs and when you can’t is not straightforward. Standardised methodology through…
Why Your Business Needs an EPD
Manufacturers don’t create Environmental Product Declarations for philosophical reasons. They respond to concrete market pressures: regulations that mandate…
EN 15804 vs ISO 21930: What’s the Difference?
Please note: This article is for educational purposes only. It does not replace the ISO and EN standards. If you work at a university, you probably already…
What is EN 16485? Understanding EPDs for Wood and Wood-Based Products
Please note: This article is for educational purposes only. It does not replace the ISO and EN standards. If you work at a university, you probably already…
What Is ISO 14020? The Framework Behind Environmental Statements
Please note: This article was substantially updated in 2026 to reflect ISO 14020:2022 and the 2026 revisions to ISO 14021, ISO 14024, and ISO 14025. This…
ISO 14040 and 14044: Life Cycle Assessment Standards
Please note: This article is for educational purposes only. It does not replace the ISO and EN standards. If you work at a university, you probably already…
ISO 14065 and 14066: Environmental Verification
Please note: This article is for educational purposes only. It does not replace the ISO and EN standards. If you work at a university, you probably already…
ISO 14067: Carbon Footprint of Products
Please note: This article is for educational purposes only. It does not replace the ISO and EN standards. If you work at a university, you probably already…
What is EN 15804?
Please note: This article is for educational purposes only. It does not replace the ISO and EN standards. If you work at a university, you probably already…
ISO 14021: Self-Declared Environmental Claims
Please note: This article was updated in 2026 to reflect the publication of ISO 14021:2026 (Edition 3), which replaced the 2016 edition. This article is for…
What Is ISO 14024? Ecolabels Explained
Please note: This article was updated in 2026 to reflect the publication of ISO 14024:2026 (Edition 3), which replaced the 2018 edition. This article is for…
What Is ISO 14025? The Framework Behind EPDs
Please note: This article was substantially updated in 2026 to reflect the publication of ISO 14025:2026 (Edition 2), which replaced the original 2006…
What is ISO 14046? Water Footprint Assessment
Please note: This article is for educational purposes only. It does not replace the ISO and EN standards. If you work at a university, you probably already…
ISO 14064: Greenhouse Gas Accounting and Verification
ISO 14064 is a family of standards for quantifying and verifying greenhouse gas emissions and removals. Published in three parts, the series covers…
What Is ISO 21930? Construction EPDs Explained
Please note: This article is for educational purposes only. It does not replace the ISO and EN standards. If you work at a university, you probably already…
Automating LCA Calculations
LCA automation is the use of scripting and programmatic tools to run Life Cycle Assessment calculations, process data, and manipulate models without doing it…
Can I mix LCA databases?
TL;DR: No, please do not do this. Introduction When conducting life cycle assessments, practitioners often work with multiple LCA databases and wonder whether…
Can LCAs be Manipulated?
Yes. LCA involves numerous methodological choices that can be selected to favour particular outcomes. Legitimate uncertainty creates opportunities for…
How Reliable are LCA Results?
LCA results carry varying levels of reliability depending on data quality, methodological rigour, and how much the product system matches your assumptions.…
How to Conduct a Life Cycle Assessment?
Knowing how to conduct a life cycle assessment starts with the four-phase structure defined by ISO 14040. Each phase builds on the previous one, with…
What are Impact Categories in LCA?
LCA impact categories translate emissions and resource consumption into environmental effects. Raw inventory data lists kilograms of CO₂, nitrogen oxides, and…
What are System Boundaries in LCA?
System boundaries define what’s included in your LCA and what’s excluded. Every LCA needs clear boundaries because no study can track everything. Defining the…
What Are the Four Phases of Life Cycle Assessment?
ISO 14040 defines four phases that structure every LCA: goal and scope definition, life cycle inventory, life cycle impact assessment, and interpretation.…
What are the Limitations of Life Cycle Assessment?
LCA provides valuable environmental insights but has inherent limitations. Understanding these limitations helps interpret results appropriately and avoid…
What Data Do I Need for an LCA?
LCA requires data on every process in your product system. Material quantities, energy consumption, transport distances, and emissions all need…
What Does Cradle-to-Grave Mean?
Cradle-to-grave tracks a product from raw material extraction through to final disposal. The “cradle” represents resource extraction from nature. The “grave”…
What is a Functional Unit?
A functional unit is the reference measurement that an LCA study is scaled against. ISO 14040 and ISO 14044 require this to be defined clearly during the Goal…
What is Allocation in Life Cycle Assessment?
Allocation in LCA determines how we split environmental impacts when a process produces multiple products. The simple approach follows mass. A system produces…
What is Attributional LCA?
Attributional LCA quantifies the environmental impacts physically attributed to a product. It asks: what emissions and resource consumption does this product…
What is Consequential LCA?
Consequential LCA estimates the environmental consequences of decisions. Instead of asking “what impacts does this product have”, it asks “what changes if we…
What is Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)?
Life cycle assessment evaluates the environmental impacts of a product, service, or process across its entire life span. This means tracking everything from…
What is openLCA?
What is openLCA? openLCA is a free, open-source Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) software developed by GreenDelta. First released in 2006, it has become one of the…
What is Prospective LCA?
Prospective LCA assesses environmental impacts of future systems. Rather than evaluating current technologies with current background data, prospective LCA…
What is System Expansion?
System expansion solves the multi-product problem differently to allocation. Instead of splitting impacts between products, you expand the system boundary to…
What is the Cut-off Method?
The cut-off method in LCA is an allocation approach for handling recycled materials. Rather than following material through multiple lifecycles, it assigns…
What is the Difference Between Carbon Footprint and LCA?
Carbon footprinting measures one impact category: climate change. LCA assesses multiple environmental impacts simultaneously. That’s the core difference.…
What is the Purpose of an LCA?
LCA exists to quantify environmental impacts across a product’s full life span. This prevents shifting burdens from one stage to another or from one impact…
Who Needs an LCA?
LCA serves anyone making decisions with environmental consequences. Manufacturers, designers, procurement teams, and policymakers all use life cycle data.…
How do you do a Whole Life Carbon Assessment?
What is Whole Life Carbon? Calculating whole life carbon means adding up every kilogram of CO₂ your building will ever cause, from quarrying the aggregate for…
What is a Whole Life Carbon Assessment (WLCA)?
Whole Life Carbon Assessment (WLCA) calculates the total carbon emissions from a building or infrastructure asset across its entire existence. From material…
What are the WLCA modules?
WLCA divides a building’s life into modules A1 through D, each capturing specific carbon emissions. This structure from EN 15804:2011+A2:2019 ensures…