The Abiotic Depletion Potential: Background, Updates, and Future

Lauran Van Oers and Jeroen Guinée
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Lauran Van Oers: Faculty of Science Institute of Environmental Sciences (CML)—Department of Industrial Ecology, Leiden University, P.O. Box 9518, Leiden 2300, RA, The Netherlands
Jeroen Guinée: Faculty of Science Institute of Environmental Sciences (CML)—Department of Industrial Ecology, Leiden University, P.O. Box 9518, Leiden 2300, RA, The Netherlands

Resources, 2016, vol. 5, issue 1, 1-12

Abstract: Depletion of abiotic resources is a much disputed impact category in life cycle assessment (LCA). The reason is that the problem can be defined in different ways. Furthermore, within a specified problem definition, many choices can still be made regarding which parameters to include in the characterization model and which data to use. This article gives an overview of the problem definition and the choices that have been made when defining the abiotic depletion potentials (ADPs) for a characterization model for abiotic resource depletion in LCA. Updates of the ADPs since 2002 are also briefly discussed. Finally, some possible new developments of the impact category of abiotic resource depletion are suggested, such as redefining the depletion problem as a dilution problem. This means taking the reserves in the environment and the economy into account in the reserve parameter and using leakage from the economy, instead of extraction rate, as a dilution parameter.

Keywords: ADP; abiotic depletion potential; life cycle assessment; abiotic natural resources; elements; minerals; resource availability; scarcity; criticality; reserves (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

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