Life Cycle Assessment Contribution in the Product Development Process: Case Study of Wood Aluminum-Laminated Panel

Franz Segovia, Pierre Blanchet, Mourad Amor, Costel Barbuta and Robert Beauregard
Additional contact information
Franz Segovia: Department of wood and forest sciences, Laval University, Quebec City, QC G1V 0A6, Canada
Pierre Blanchet: Department of wood and forest sciences, Laval University, Quebec City, QC G1V 0A6, Canada
Costel Barbuta: Department of Secondary Manufacturing, FPInnovations, Montreal, QC G1V 4C7, Canada
Robert Beauregard: Department of wood and forest sciences, Laval University, Quebec City, QC G1V 0A6, Canada

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 8, 1-20

Abstract: The benefits of aluminum lamination in improving the physical and mechanical properties of wood-based composites is now well documented. This paper shows the contribution of life cycle assessment (LCA) as a tool to assess and compare the environmental footprint in the development of laminated panels. SimaPro 9.0 software, using Ecoinvent database was used to analyze the environmental impacts associated with the manufacturing of wood aluminum-laminated (WAL) panels and aluminum honeycomb panel (AHP). The impact 2002+ method was used to estimate environmental impacts. The LCA results show that the WAL panels manufacturing had a lower environmental impact than AHP manufacturing. In term of product, wood-based composites were the best choice as a core in laminated panel manufacturing. Wood-based composite manufacturing showed environmental advantages in all damage categories except in ecosystem quality. Aluminum alloy sheets manufacturing played an important role in the generation of environmental impacts for laminated panel development.

Keywords: product development; wood-based composite; aluminum alloy sheet; laminated panel; LCA; environmental performance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/8/2258/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/8/2258/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:8:p:2258-:d:222872

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().