CASE STUDY
Product Line LCAs & Custom LCA Tool
A carbon black manufacturer hired JBE to conduct 350 LCAs for its diverse range of products produced across its global operations. Additionally, JBE developed a custom LCA tool to enable the client to generate results for new products themselves.
THE CLIENT’S CHALLENGE
A carbon black manufacturer, anticipating increased scrutiny from industry and stakeholders, proactively engaged JBE to conduct life cycle assessments (LCAs) for all its carbon black grades worldwide. Carbon black is a black powder made by the incomplete burning of fossil fuels and is widely used as a reinforcement in tires, a pigment, and an additive for rubber and plastic, among other applications. Our client aimed to understand the environmental impacts of its various processes and locations, commissioning LCAs for each product line and facility—totaling over 350 products. These assessments were designed to identify the processes and materials with the most significant environmental impacts globally, enabling targeted investigation and improvement.
OUR SOLUTION
The client had no downstream control of how customers used their products, so we suggested a ‘cradle to gate’ LCA as their feedstocks were likely to have the largest environmental impacts.
We learned that some of the feedstocks did not have much environmental information that was shared publicly or on licensed databases, so we conducted research to develop the appropriate emission factors to be used to estimate the upstream environmental burden of the products. Our report results concentrated on differences in locations as well as a global average product impact, allowing the client to identify and establish ‘best practices’ in production and the procurement of raw materials.
Custom LCA Tool for Client Use
After completing such a comprehensive study, and with the client’s desire to conduct LCAs on a more frequent basis for new product development, we proposed to create a custom LCA tool so that their team could generate LCA results on new products by themselves with minimal involvement from us. As you can imagine, they were thrilled with the idea! We went to work customizing LCA software (openLCA) and combined it with a client-facing Microsoft Excel workbook that enabled the quick manipulation of data with toggle buttons and drop-down menus for fixed variables. We also trained an individual on our client’s team so that they could become the internal expert in operating the LCA tool.
OUR IMPACT
The client is now armed with their environmental impact hotspots so they can reduce their footprint in a meaningful way. Additionally, our client can now use their custom LCA tool to get LCA results on products themselves, with minimal support from JBE. The custom tool is a game-changer as they can now save time and money by generating their own LCA results on new products for stakeholder requests, government regulations, and for decision making by R&D teams in the product creation process.