Life Cycle Inventory 

Environment Canada 2feb01

The life-cycle concept is a "cradle to grave" approach to thinking about products, processes and services. It recognizes that all product life-cycle stages (extracting and processing raw materials, manufacturing, transportation and distribution, use/reuse, and recycling and waste management) have environmental and economic impacts. 

Government, business and non-governmental organizations can apply the life-cycle concept to their decision-making processes related to environment and product policy, design, and improvement. The life-cycle approach can also be used as a scientific tool for gathering quantitative data to inventory, weigh and rank the environmental burdens of products, processes and services.

Unlike more specific "end of pipe" or "within the plant gate" approaches to environmental management, decision makers can apply the life-cycle approach to all of the upstream and downstream implications of site-specific actions. An example might be changes in emission levels that result from changing a raw material in the production process.

Related tools to life cycle management include: life-cycle assessment, design for environment, life-cycle cost accounting, eco-efficiency, environmental auditing or profiling, environmental benchmarking, environmental performance evaluation, etc.

Industry use of life-cycle assessment (LCA) as a tool to improve environmental performance is increasing. An LCA quantifies energy and resource inputs and outputs at all stages of a life-cycle, then determines and weighs the associated impacts to set the stage for improvements. Most attempts to develop life-cycle assessments have focused on the first two of four phases, namely, initiation and inventory analysis. A complete LCA study adds two further phases: impact assessment and improvement assessment.

The diagram below breaks down a product life-cycle inventory into inputs and outputs for material and energy, as well as environmental releases.

For more information on Life Cycle Management refer to the publication entitled:

Environmental Life Cycle Management: A Guide to Better Business Decisions (Environment Canada, 1997)

source: http://www.ec.gc.ca/ecocycle/english/whatislcm.cfm