ABSTRACT
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a method to assess environmental impacts of cradle-to-grave chains connected to products or services. It compiles and evaluates the inputs, outputs and the potential environmental impacts of a product system throughout its life cycle (ISO, 1996). The environmental inputs and outputs include emissions, but also the use of resources such as land, water and minerals. Traditionally, this analysis is done at the micro-level and uses a static, steady-state approach. Recently, the LCA field has started to broaden its horizon. Life cycle thinking is now also used at a higher scale level, for forward-looking analyses and for assessing social and economic impacts. This broadened field of science is nowadays indicated as Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment, which is rather a framework than a method in itself. The development of quantitative methods for LSCA is now in full progress. This may open up possibilities to account for nexus issues in a more dynamic and integrated way. In this chapter, we briefly describe the LCA method and outline the potential of this method to address resource nexus issues. Then we will explore the possibilities of LCSA to include more of these aspects. We conclude by a summing up of the strengths and limitations of the LCA approach in addressing the resource nexus.
