Introduction to the Handbook on Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment

Life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA) emerges in response to the growing societal and environmental pressures and the increasing demand from decision-makers at all levels to count on soft and hard resources that facilitate the systematic understanding of direct and indirect impacts of products and organizations and identification of balanced solutions.
The aim of this Handbook on Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment is to present the state of the art of LCSA practice and developments as an orientation for its implementation by practitioners and to provide an outlook for future work.
This Handbook targets sustainability analysts and managers and overall decision-makers from the private and public sectors as well as experts and learners from academia.
The Handbook on Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment is structured into four overarching themes. The first part (Part I) introduces the historical background leading to sustainability in business as a megatrend, life cycle thinking and life cycle sustainability management (LCSM).
The second part (Part II) on LCSA methodology and data is the core of the Handbook. This part presents the current state of the art of what is considered to be the most relevant life cycle methods for LCSA. The most accepted and applied life cycle methods that provide the basis of an LCSA are environmental life cycle assessment (LCA), social LCA (S-LCA) and life cycle costing (LCC). In this part, the goal and scope definition and inventory analysis are described, then the impact assessment and interpretation phases are explained, and finally the aspects of critical review and communication are addressed. The challenges of LCSA data management aspects are also discussed and approaches representing a move beyond the status quo elaborated. The next part (Part III) introduces the operationalization of integrated application of LCSA in the private and public sectors around the world, including the implementation as a management approach (LCSM). The last part (Part IV) identifies emerging areas that are
growing or that are in need of attention as further research is required. It also analyses the conditions under which mainstreaming of LCSA could be achieved around the world.
In the following sections, a high-level overview is presented on the key elements contained in each of the four parts, followed by the take-away messages and outlook.