Combining ecological and economic assessment of options for newspaper waste management

Helena Dahlbo, Markku Ollikainen, Sanna Peltola, Tuuli Myllymaa and Matti Melanen

Resources, Conservation & Recycling, 2007, vol. 51, issue 1, 42-63

Abstract: We combined life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) with economic analysis of social life cycle costs (SLCC) to investigate five alternatives for newspaper waste management. The alternatives consisted of various recovery and treatment methods applicable to newspaper in a separately collected paper fraction and to newspaper in mixed waste. We linked LCIA and SLCC to each other at three different stages. First, we used LCIA to rank our alternatives and asked how this ranking relates to the SLCC associated with each alternative. Second, we solved the cost minimizing problem and asked how this purely economic ranking relates to our LCIA ranking. Third, we solved the cost minimizing problem when external costs from the use of fossil fuels were included and then compared the solution to the LCIA results. Many useful features emerged. Tying economic analysis firmly to the steps of LCA helps to produce consistent SLCCs. Economic analysis can also be helpful in defining the boundaries of the product system and to facilitate decisions on avoided impacts. Finally, given that environmental policies usually involve trade-offs between environmental and economic factors, economic analysis conducted consistently with LCA complements LCA in a way that can be expected to make the results of the analysis more useful for policy making.

Keywords: Life cycle impact assessment; LCIA; Economic analysis; Social cost; Waste management; Newspaper; Landfill; Recycling; Energy recovery; Incineration (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:recore:v:51:y:2007:i:1:p:42-63

DOI: 10.1016/j.resconrec.2006.08.001

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