Error in impact assessment

[Frida Hermansson]

I have a lifecycle divided into three parts: manufacturing, use phase and end of life treatment and wants to compare two different products. The manufacturing is different, but the end of life and use phase are the same for the both cases. For case 1, the impacts from the manufacturing are less than in case 2. Although, the impacts from end of life and use phase are about 8 times higher for case 1. The values and included processes are all the same. Is there any way there can be a bug (I have looked and looked after the error and cannot find it).

//Frida

[gebbissimo1]

Hi Frida,

unfortunately I cannot be of much help, but I doubt that this is a bug in openLCA. Even if there is a bug with a process, I cannot imagine why it would pop up in one product system and not the other one. Thus, I would currently bet that you got one number false. Can't you narrow down the bug by yourself? If I were you I would...

- create the use phase and end of life phase each as a process
- create two identical product systems which have as input only the two processes use phase and end of life phase, not the manufacturing phase. LCI and LCIA results HAVE to be the same now. Note the results.
- calculate the LCI (or LCIA) of the two different manufacturing processes (via creating a process and product system each). Note the results.
- now subsequently add the two different manufacturing phases to the first two product systems. Is the result what you expected, i.e. the manually calculated sum?