Speaker
Description
Life cycle assessment (LCA) is the systematic estimation and evaluation of environmental impacts over the life cycle of technical systems and provides the framework and data to support eco-design. ESA, as part of their eco-design initiative, in the last few years has initiated several projects for LCA data regarding materials, components, manufacturing processes, space propellants and missions. The Agency is also making LCA as part of development contracts, providing a source for expanding the LCA library for space systems. In this presentation, we describe the opportunities and challenges for the space industry from an aligned LCA database for space systems, with discussions based on an ongoing ESA contract to review, evaluate and harmonize existing ESA LCA data.
Prior to harmonization, the ESA database contained ~ 1500 individual LCA datasets. This will represent a vital library of environmental data for eco-design, and includes subsystems, materials, components and processes. However, the management and use of the database brings challenges regarding confidentiality of industry data and requires quality criteria for existing datasets and for additions to the database.
The presentation will show an overview of the LCA database and illustrate how these are used to model space technology. Moreover, we discuss major gaps identified in the finalized database, and the formats to handle confidentiality and continuous expansion of new data through ESA contracts. The space industry’s perspective on these discussions is greatly welcome
