LCA Case Studies

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The German Waste Avoidance, Recovery and Disposal Act (KrW-/AbfG) creates the demand to select for "high quality" and "environmentally sound" waste treatment and disposal techniques. Waste disposers have to choose the most "high quality" and "environmentally sound" technique among different treatment and disposal options, and therefore must have a way to comparably evaluate the different techniques. Prognos developed an assessment method called HoVe to evaluate waste treatment and disposal facilities based on these new guidelines. It adheres to international standards of life cycle assessments (DIN/ISO 14 040). The assessment is based on emission, material, energy and economic data which already exists, making it practical, time and cost efficient.
HoVe employs three Impact Categories (IC) to evaluate the impact of waste treatment. Each IC is characterized by Impact Clusters (ICL) to which original plant data are allocated. The ICL consider the amount and quality of produced products and residues from treatment processes, as well as the issues of ecological impact and energy balance. Further they incorporate economic aspects in order to assess the economic soundness of treatment and disposal plants, a requirement of the KrW-/AbfG. A pilot assessment of treatment options for shredder residues proves the viability of the method.