How can you use LCA to foster stakeholder engagement?

(a) Transparency - Share LCA results openly, highlighting environmental impacts & potential improvements (b) Collaboration - Involve stakeholders in the LCA process, seeking input & perspectives, enhancing the study's relevance & acceptance. (c) Education - Use LCA data to inform stakeholders about product lifecycle impacts, encouraging informed decision-making. (d) Innovation - Stimulate ideas for sustainable practices & products through LCA insights, promoting joint problem-solving. (e) Communication - Regularly update stakeholders on LCA progress & outcomes, ensuring alignment & shared goals. (f) Responsiveness - Address stakeholder concerns & suggestions, demonstrating commitment to environmental stewardship & continuous improvement.

LCA is a vital tool for businesses in the modern world. It not only enables us to make informed decisions about our products and processes but also fosters a sense of responsibility toward the environment. Embracing LCA can lead to more sustainable practices, which is not just good for business but also essential for the well-being of our planet.

Hidden benefit of LCA - comprehensively assessing the life cycle of a product or process, including its production, use, and disposal, you gain insights that go beyond ecological concerns. LCA enables you to share a complete sustainability story with your stakeholders. It's a great tool for transparency, helping you communicate your commitment to environmental responsibility. Whether you're engaging with customers who seek eco-friendly products, suppliers looking to align with sustainable partners, or investors focused on responsible business practices, LCA provides the data and narrative to build trust and enhance your reputation. Embrace LCA not only as an analytical tool but also as a conversation starter on your sustainability journey.

LCA can be a complex tool. How can organizations strike the right balance between providing transparent and credible information to stakeholders and avoiding overwhelming them with technical details?

Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) is crucial for evaluating the sustainability of eco-friendly products comprehensively. It examines the entire product life cycle, considering the problem it solves. For example, comparing walking and biking, a bicycle may be more sustainable when considering factors like food consumption and efficiency. LCA helps define the perspective for measuring sustainability (the functional unit), allowing standardized, comparable environmental assessments in various sectors, like the airline industry's efficiency measurement based on kilograms per kilometer traveled. This approach ensures systematic environmental value assessment.

An LCA can help consumers - either B2B or B2C - to understand the environmental impact of your products over a longer time horizon. An LCA can be a useful tool to indicate to customers that you have considered a products life and chosen materials or processes that extend or the 'use phase'. The UK CMA Green Claims Guide (how not to greenwash) recommend considering the full lifecycle when making environmental claims about products. I would however, also urge caution in isolated LCA use as it can inadvertently lead to greenwashing by giving a misleading impression where - for instance - the LCA is conducted in respect of carbon when in fact the product has a large environmental impact elsewhere - water for instance.

Meeting customer demands for environmental transparency and sustainability is not just a trend; it's a business imperative. LCA is the key to fostering trust and loyalty by providing customers with the eco-information they seek. It's a win-win: informed customers make greener choices, and businesses earn their loyalty by delivering products and services that align with sustainable values.

For example, in the case of textile materials, it is very important to be able to compare these LCA given that there is a very significant variability in the consumption or impact of each stage depending on whether they are natural, artificial or synthetic materials. These differences can mean that if only one stage is taken into account and not the whole life cycle, it is possible to believe that one material is more sustainable than another without having all the information, and consequently be a partial or mistaken opinion.

When larger companies invest in LCAs for their products they then can provide them to their customers. This then enables those business customers to report their carbon emissions and other environmental impacts. As well as choose the best inputs. An example was a client of mine that used a Ball Corp. container. Ball provided an LCA which meant their customer (which in this case was a smaller company) didn’t have to invest money to get this data themselves. This is one of the ways to create a robust set of shared data to fill a really big current gap.

Sharing LCA results is like sharing your school transcripts. They are only meaningful when contextualized and combined with an action plan. Some organizations may have the best LCA results owning to where they operate and the abundance of sustainable resources. Others less fortunate organizations will have to create a pathway that is deemed abnormal in where they operate. Stakeholders are looking for a positive change in LCA overtime.

Collaborating with suppliers on environmental improvements is a powerful strategy for enhancing sustainability along your value chain. LCA not only helps set the stage for eco-friendly procurement but also nurtures strong, sustainable relationships with suppliers who share your commitment to responsible practices, ultimately benefiting your business and the planet.

As supply chains wrestle with their climate impact, and individual actors recognise that most impact occurs not through their own activities, but activities carried out in their name, then an LCA can become a tool for education and engagement along the supply chain in the shared challenge of reducing negative impacts, as well an opportunity for fostering collaboration to seek out positive benefits. The stark facts of a robust LCA are a strong motivator for change, however the dilemma for small suppliers can be how to access LCAs so this is an opportunity for larger, forward-thinking customers to share their LCAs with smaller suppliers, promote supplier access to tools like HowGood Latis and sponsor supplier sustainability programmes.

To achieve this, setting a clear Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) objective is essential. This involves defining the desired environmental footprint for a product or service and aiming for a greener alternative compared to what is available in the market. LCA provides valuable insights into the emission profiles and can help identify suppliers responsible for emissions in the production process. By analyzing LCA results, you can pinpoint problematic suppliers and work with them to ensure more sustainable practices. Without this data, it would be challenging to track emissions sources and substantiate any environmental claims in the marketplace.

Suppliers are vital stakeholders. LCA can be used to set environmental criteria and standards for procurement. By encouraging suppliers to adhere to green purchasing policies and eco-design guidelines, you ensure a more sustainable supply chain. Collaborating with suppliers to enhance their environmental performance, rewarding top performers, and recognizing their efforts through certification or incentives can strengthen these relationships.

Investors are placing a growing emphasis on sustainability, and using LCA to communicate your ESG efforts is a strategic move. By demonstrating a strong commitment to environmental responsibility and innovation, you not only attract environmentally conscious investors but also improve transparency and accountability in your financial reporting, which can ultimately boost your reputation and financial performance.

A rough LCA can help as well to take decisions before making investments. If a decision to invest in two or more options requires to know which is the one with the best sustainability (environmentally, socially and economically) profile, having the data provides more data to take the right decision. Combining Environmental LCA, Social LCA and LCC can be a powerful tool to take financial decisions.

You can't manage what you don't measure - and LCA is a great platform to analyze and identify the quantitative environmental impact of your product, process or service throughout its entire lifecycle. It is very useful because the insights delivered by LCA allow the organization to make better decisions in terms of product development, marketing, strategic planning and policy-making. As such, investors would be highly attracted to companies that show their commitment to sustainability by performing LCA.

Some investors prioritize Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) considerations, and some even have ESG mandates, exclusively supporting projects and businesses with strong ESG profiles. Conducting a Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) can be a valuable tool to attract both types of investors. Notably, ESG-focused investors often place less emphasis on financial returns, making it feasible to accept slightly lower returns on green investments that align with their values.

Engaging with regulators through LCA is vital for your business. Compliance ensures you're meeting the standards set by authorities, avoiding penalties, and upholding a positive reputation. Additionally, active participation in the regulatory process allows you to shape rules in ways that align with your sustainability goals and the broader interests of society, contributing to a more responsible and sustainable business environment.

Policy making includes principles and outcomes such as - “polluter pays” (polluter should be responsible for environmental cost) - precautionary principle (activity is not allowed when there is a chance that the consequences are irreversible) - deepest pocket pays / wealth distribution - making the party best able to control the risk near the loss arising from such risk eventuating LCA can help identify challenging portions of value chains so that policy makers and regulators can determine the appropriate principles to apply to solve these challenges.

Companies like Interface have used LCA not only to meet net zero targets (which they did back in 2019) but also utilise LCA for what they call "Climate Take Back" where they aim to become carbon negative by 2040. They use LCA not only to meet regulatory requirements, but go beyond through innovation to push regulatory boundaries for higher industry standards.

This is a complex issue as it involves regulatory frameworks and certification. Typically, regulators dictate the rules for consumers and market operators. If these regulators have not yet incorporated environmental principles into the regulations, there's limited immediate action one can take. However, it is possible to engage with regulators to influence changes in the regulatory framework to better align with desired environmental goals, given that regulators are responsible for safeguarding public interests. If regulators make the wrong decisions, it could have adverse consequences for society at large.

Regulatory compliance is a must. LCA helps in ensuring adherence to environmental rules and policies like carbon taxes and emission trading schemes. Proactively analyzing the regulatory landscape, impact assessments, and policy evaluation can prepare you for upcoming changes. Further, using LCA to contribute insights and data for regulatory development fosters a positive relationship with regulators.

Engaging employees through LCA is a win-win strategy. Educating and involving them in environmental initiatives not only improves your sustainability performance but also fosters a sense of pride and purpose among your workforce. When employees feel empowered and aligned with the company's sustainability goals, it creates a positive workplace culture, attracts top talent, and ultimately contributes to long-term business success.

If made with good care, the kind of structure LCA is, it automatically invites interest of employees. Just like the materials in a circular value chain can come from multiple locations, employees pool in variety of perspective in managing the LCA. The pooled-in knowledge is critical and can be captured through 1 to 1 sessions, workshops and public activities as well. The employee programs can be captured in form of a program that further increases engagement and drives incentives for them.

Making an LCA model might not be necessary for all your employees, but a good idea is that they work together in a workshop to find the environmental impacts along the full life cycle of the products or services the company offers, and how their own work and daily work activities could influence that. Engage the employees to understand that, every single action they take in their daily work could affect somehow the full company's impact. By having a life cycle vision of their own activity, they can come up with ideas on how to contribute to reduce the impact of the full company. Every single action counts. They shall feel empowered and considered into the corporate sustainability strategies so they can act accordingly.

It is primarily about authenticity, demonstrating to your employees a genuine commitment to environmental responsibility throughout your business, which fosters a culture of sustainability. This approach empowers employees, making them feel they are contributing to minimizing environmental harm through their work. When the organization's leaders emphasize the importance of environmental footprints and integrate Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) into their decision-making process, it sets a leadership example. This, in turn, influences employees to make sustainable choices not only at work but also in their personal lives.

Engaging experts is crucial for conducting a comprehensive and credible Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) due to its complexity. In this new field, experts have access to specialized tools and methodologies, ensuring thorough checks and reliable results. It is imperative to maintain authenticity when performing LCA and not manipulate the process to achieve a desired outcome. LCA may reveal uncomfortable truths, but it should be seen as a tool for progressing toward sustainability objectives. The choice of key functions and setting the right functional unit is vital, as it can significantly impact the LCA results, aligning commercial value with environmental value.

It would be great to hear about specific case studies or success stories where LCA was effectively used to engage with stakeholders and the outcomes that were achieved. Please share any relevant examples or insights.