Collaborative Research: Dynamic simulation approaches to consequential life cycle assessment to evaluate recycling and substitution in metal and paper-derived products

1605050 (Olivetti)/ 1602916 （Beach）生命周期评估是对产品、过程和服务的环境影响进行建模的工具。后续生命周期评估（cLCA）关注的是由利益相关者决策引起的变化如何影响学习市场以及其他市场。当前的建模方法要么在范围上太受限制，要么在概念上太具有挑战性，限制了它们对系统的一小部分的适用性。该项目的目的是发展cLCA的一般方法和质量方面，重点是加强利益相关者的互动。该方法将应用于纸/纸板和铝系统，重点是主要材料和回收材料以及替代材料的单独市场的存在如何影响政策。本研究将提供一个总体框架，以扩大cLCA可以有效应用的案例数量。建立在研究团队的基础上？根据之前评估材料市场和土地使用影响的工作，这将通过以下方式完成：1)通过实证分析、计量经济学和物料流模型的结合，量化供给的经济和响应特征；2)通过对关键部门的效用函数和决策过程的定量描述，量化需求的经济和响应特征；3)通过参数化生命周期清单模拟供需互动。这个项目填补了cLCA文献的空白，在一个内生反馈模拟平台上开发了一个环境、物理和经济模型。回收政策领域包括一系列不同的利益相关者，这项工作将调查如何有效地使用沟通工具，如物质流程图，使政策模型更加透明和更具互动性。作者假设强大的智力贡献可以在跨一系列领域的方法发展中锻造，这些领域模拟复杂材料系统变化的后果，包括材料可用性评估和LCA。补贴和税收等政策措施经常用于促进材料的回收或替代环境性能得到改善的材料。决策者面临的问题是如何在立法资源有限的情况下指导政策产生最大的积极影响。当前的分析工具评估当地回收的直接影响，即针对特定的材料，产品和区域。本文描述的方法将为寻求评估全球影响的行业和政策制定者提供信息，即最大化（和优化）许多材料，产品和地区的回收效益。例如，对于想要了解政策的净影响和变化后的新基线的联邦或州一级的政策制定者来说，这将是有用的。虽然cLCA目前被用来为美国的生物燃料政策提供信息，但它可以扩展到为提高材料可持续性的立法提供信息。cLCA方法有可能回答以下问题：在材料回收和替代方面，如果有或没有拟议的政策，未来的情景会是什么样子？哪些产品应该回收、填埋并用于生产能源？政策对其他经济领域的具体影响是什么？就纸张系统而言，利益相关者表示强烈需要一种工具来补充他们目前用于评估再生纸对环境影响的工具（目前的工具基于归因LCA）。从模型开发的初始阶段一直到最终结果，与广泛的利益相关者进行沟通的可能性尤其令人兴奋。因此，预计我们的最终模型将立即用作纸浆和造纸工业环境政策的决策支持工具。

1605050 (Olivetti)/ 1602916 (Beach)Life cycle assessment is a tool for modeling the environmental impact of products, processes and services. Consequential life cycle assessment (cLCA) focuses on how changes, resulting from a stakeholder decision, impact the market of study as well as other markets. Current modeling approaches are either too restricted in scope or too conceptually challenging, limiting their applicability to a small subset of systems. The aims of this project are to develop the general methodology and develop the qualitative aspect of cLCA with a focus on enhanced stakeholder interaction. The methodology will be applied to the paper/paperboard and aluminum systems with a focus on how the presence of separate markets for primary and recycled material, as well as substitute materials, influences policy.This research will provide a general framework to expand the number of cases to which cLCA can be effectively applied. Building upon the research team?s previous work evaluating materials markets and land use impacts, this will be accomplish by: 1) quantifying the economic and response characteristics of supply through a combination of empirical analysis, econometrics, and material flow modeling 2) quantifying the economic and response characteristics of demand through quantitative description of the utility function and decision processes of key sectors, and 3) demonstrating a simulation of supply-demand interaction coupled with parametric life cycle inventories. This project fills a gap in the cLCA literature by developing a combined environmental, physical, and economic model in an endogenous feedback simulation platform. The recycling policy arena consists of a diverse set of stakeholders and this work will investigate how effective use of communication tools, such as material flow diagrams, can make policy models both more transparent and more interactive. The authors hypothesize that strong intellectual contributions can be forged in melding methodological developments across the set of fields that model consequences of change in complex materials systems, including materials availability assessment and LCA. Policy measures such as subsidies and taxes are often used to promote materials recycling or substitution to materials with perceived improved environmental performance. The problem faced by decision makers is how to direct policy to have the greatest positive impact given limited legislative resources. Current analysis tools evaluate the direct impact of recycling locally, i.e. for a specific material, product and region. The methods described herein will inform industry and policy makers seeking to evaluate the impact globally, i.e. maximize (and optimize) the benefits of recycling over many materials, products, and regions. For example, this would be useful for policy makers at the federal or state level wanting to understand the net impact of a policy and the new baseline following change. While cLCA is currently used to inform the US policy for biofuels, it may be extendible to inform legislation towards improved materials sustainability. The cLCA approach has the potential to answer questions such as: What would future scenarios look like with and without proposed policies in materials recycling and substitution? Which products should be recycled, landfilled, and used to produce energy? What are the specific implications of policy for other parts of the economy? In the case of the paper system, stakeholders have expressed a strong need for a tool that is supplemental to the ones they currently use to assess environmental impact of recycled paper (current tools are based on attributional LCA). Excitement has been particularly strong for the possibility to communicate with a broad set of stakeholders from the initial stages of model development and all the way to the results. It is therefore expect that our final model will find immediate use as decision-support tool for environmental policy in the pulp and paper industry.