Characterization of the terrestrial ecotoxicological impact category in LCIA for mixtures of pollutants

生命周期评估（LCA）是一种评估产品、过程或服务的每个生命周期阶段（即从原材料提取到最终处置）对环境影响的方法。LCA包括四个阶段：1)目标和范围的定义；2)生命周期量表（LCI）；生命周期影响评价（LCIA）；4)解释（ISO 14040, 2006）。LCIA阶段至关重要，包括评估潜在的环境影响。在影响类别中，毒理学和生态毒理学影响类别与其他类别不同，反映的是局部影响而不是全球影响。因此，由于这些影响的特殊性，建模更为复杂，并且需要考虑到空间分异。在使用LCA作为污染场地管理的决策工具的背景下，当比较主要影响（由土壤污染引起的）和次要影响（由修复活动本身引起的）时，这个问题变得明显。由于LCIA中使用的模型的通用性，该领域的许多研究忽略了主要影响的表征。为了更好地评估污染场地的主要影响，需要进行以下研究：1)使LCIA全球多媒体命运模型适应当地尺度；2)开发陆地效应数据，以避免像目前这样使用水生数据；3)开发表征因子（cf），用于通常在污染土壤中发现的污染物混合物。为了以适当的方式描述陆地生态毒理学影响类别，将改进为加拿大环境背景开发的LCIA方法LUCAS。本研究项目旨在使LCIA在评估与污染场地管理相关的影响时更具相关性和科学性。目前，加拿大在陆地生态和环境评价领域的专家人数相当少，特别是在描述诸如生态毒理学陆地影响等当地影响方面。

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is an approach for assessing the environmental impacts associated with each life cycle stage (i.e. from raw material extraction to final disposal) of a product, process or service. An LCA consists of four phases: 1) Goal & scope definition; 2) Life cycle inventory (LCI); 3) Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA); and 4) Interpretation (ISO 14040, 2006). The LCIA phase is crucial and consists of assessing the environmental potential impacts. Among impact categories, toxicological and ecotoxicological impact categories, unlike the others, reflect local rather than global impacts. These impacts are thus more complicated to model due to their specific character and require spatial differentiation to be taking into account. In the context of using LCA as a decision-making tool for contaminated site management, this problem becomes evident when comparing primary impacts (caused by the soil contamination) to secondary impacts (caused by the remediation activities themselves). Many studies in this field neglect the characterization of primary impacts due to the generic aspect of models used in LCIA. In order to better assess primary impacts of contaminated sites, research is needed to 1) adapt LCIA global multimedia fate models to a local scale, 2) develop terrestrial effect data to avoid using aquatic data as is currently the case and 3) develop characterization factors (CFs) for mixtures of contaminants that are generally found in contaminated soils. To characterize in an appropriate way the terrestrial ecotoxicological impact category, LUCAS, an LCIA method developed for the Canadian environmental context will be improved. This research program aims to make LCIA more relevant and scientifically defendable when assessing impacts related to contaminated site management. Currently, the number of Canadian specialists in the LCA field is quite low, particularly with respect to the characterization of local impacts such as ecotoxicological terrestrial impact.