LCA Food 2012 in Saint Malo, France! - Manifestations et colloques ...

PLENARY SESSION 2: METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES FOR ANIMAL PRODUCTION SYSTEMS 8 th Int. Conference on
LCA in the
Agri-Food Sector, 1-4 Oct 2012
Lessons learned from integrated environmental and socioeconomic life
cycle assessments
Jean-Michel Couture 1,* , Julie Parent 2 , Mia Lafontaine 3 , Jean-Pierre Revéret 1,2
1 Groupe AGECO, 2014 Cyrille-Duquet suite 307, Quebec, QC, G1N 4N6, Canada
2 International Chair on Life Cycle, Polytechnique/ESG UQAM; Department of Strategy, Social and Environmental Responsibility,
Suite R-3555, École des sciences de la gestion, Montreal, QC, H2X 3X2, Canada
3 Quantis, 395 Laurier Ouest, Montreal, QC, H2V 2K3, Canada
Corresponding author. E-mail: jean-michel.couture@groupeageco.ca
ABSTRACT
An integrated Social and Environmental LCA was conducted to assess the environmental and socioeconomic performance of Canadian
milk production. During the project, a number of issues and challenges arose from the integration of the two LCA techniques.
This presentation focuses on the key findings and lessons learned from the study regarding the procedural and methodological integration
of ELCA and SLCA. It takes stock of the difficulties faced by realisation teams at the main stages of the LCA study and the
benefits resulting from such an integrated approach, thus contributing to the reflexion and works already started towards the development
of Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment methodology.
Keywords: Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment, social life cycle assessment, environmental life cycle assessment, dairy production,
Canada
1. Introduction
Over the years, the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach has become one of the main tools used to
provide market actors with the information needed to turn toward more sustainable consumption and production
practices. Initially developed to assess the potential environmental impacts of a product through the
Environmental Life Cycle Assessment (ELCA), this approach has since evolved to encompass all three pillars
of sustainability by combining ELCA with Life Cycle Costing (LCC) – a technique assessing the cost
implications of a product’s life cycle – and Social Life Cycle Assessment (SLCA) – a more recent technique
assessing the social and socioeconomic impacts of a product’s life cycle.
However, despite their common conceptual foundations, these LCA tools still lack the integrated framework
that would guide a comprehensive assessment of a product’s sustainability. Although the
UNEP/SETAC Life Cycle Initiative is currently developing a Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA)
methodology, further developments are admittedly needed, in particular based on findings and lessons
learned from cases combining ELCA, LCC and SLCA (UNEP/SETAC 2012, 45).
LCA and its different forms are part of the environmental assessment toolbox, and the question of integration
in environmental assessment has been debated for some years about other tools such as Environmental
Impact Assessment (EIA) and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) (Revéret 2011). There are many
coexisting understandings of what “Integrated Assessment” is (Hacking and Guthrie, 2007). For instance,
Lee (2006) identifies three distinct types of integration: 1) Horizontal: bringing together different types or
categories of impacts; 2) Vertical: linking separate assessments performed at different levels/stages; and 3)
Analytical: integration of assessments into decision-making. Regarding a project’s execution, Eggenberger
and Partidário (2000) identify three different forms of integration that were also tested and used by Revéret
et al., (2000: 1) Substantive: constant consideration of social, environmental and economic (SEE) dimensions
in all aspects of the studies; 2) Methodological: integration of concepts and applications; and 3) Procedural:
integration of SEE dimensions in the project’s planning and management. This last category is of
particular interest as it was developed to analyse how integrated other forms of environmental valuation are,
namely EIA and SEA.
On the basis of the definition of ‘integration’ given by Eggenberger and Partidario (2000), this paper discusses
the ‘integration’ of Social and Environmental LCAs of the Canadian dairy sector, a study that we
recently carried out. This presentation takes stock of integration issues and challenges encountered in this
project, considering both procedural and methodological perspectives. The economic dimension, which
could have been assessed with a LCC, is not considered here as it was not identified as a priority by the client.
2. Project overview
As part of the Dairy Cluster research program, the Dairy Farmers of Canada (DFC), in collaboration with
Quantis Canada, Group AGÉCO and the CIRAIG (The Interuniversity Research Centre for the Life Cycle of
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