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‘Socializing’ sustainability: a critical review on current development status of social life cycle impact assessment method

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Abstract

Social life cycle assessment (S-LCA) is a technique to assess the potential social impacts of a product or service caused by its life cycle. The aim of this paper is to critically review the methodologies applied in S-LCIA and establish its current development status by highlighting areas for improvement. The UNEP/SETAC Guidelines published in 2009 provided general procedures for conducting S-LCA, but lack S-LCIA methods. Many new S-LCIA methods have been proposed but these are inherently different, indicating a scientific and well-accepted S-LCIA method is yet to be developed. Broadly, two types of S-LCIA methods, i.e. performance reference point and impact pathways methods are in use. A direction for future research could be the refinement of the social hotspots database and the social hotspot index calculation method. Moreover, the S-LCIA method could be developed by combining the performance reference point and impact pathways methods.

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Notes

  1. International Labour Organisation.

  2. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

  3. The point that lies somewhere on the impact pathway as an intermediate point between the LCI results and the damage or end of the pathways.

  4. The attribute or aspect of natural environment, human health, or resources, identifying an environmental issue giving cause for concern or damage categories.

  5. Refer to (Dreyer et al. 2010a, b) for detailed calculation steps.

  6. Uniform System for the Evaluation of Substances Adapted for LCA Purposes (USE-LCA).

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Acknowledgments

The financial assistance of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) to conduct this research work is highly appreciated. We acknowledge the research assistance of Dr. Bahareh Reza. Also, the three anonymous reviewers are appreciated for their valuable comments.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Engineering, University of British Columbia, Okanagan Campus, 3333 University Way, Kelowna, BC, V1V 1V7, Canada

    Gyan Kumar Chhipi-Shrestha, Kasun Hewage & Rehan Sadiq

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  1. Gyan Kumar Chhipi-Shrestha
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  2. Kasun Hewage
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  3. Rehan Sadiq
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Correspondence to Rehan Sadiq.

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Chhipi-Shrestha, G.K., Hewage, K. & Sadiq, R. ‘Socializing’ sustainability: a critical review on current development status of social life cycle impact assessment method. Clean Techn Environ Policy 17, 579–596 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10098-014-0841-5

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