IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v4y2012i10p2430-2442d20383.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Identification and Selection of Alternative Scenarios in LCA Studies of Integrated Waste Management Systems: A Review of Main Issues and Perspectives

Author

Listed:
  • Valentino Tascione

    (Department of Economic Studies, “G. d’Annunzio” University, Viale Pindaro, 42, Pescara, Italy)

  • Andrea Raggi

    (Department of Economic Studies, “G. d’Annunzio” University, Viale Pindaro, 42, Pescara, Italy)

Abstract

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a decision support tool that can be used to assess the environmental performance of an integrated waste management system or to identify the system with the best performance through a comparative analysis of different scenarios. The results of the analysis depend primarily on how the scenarios to be compared are defined, that is on which waste fractions are assumed to be sent to certain treatments/destinations and in what amounts. This paper reviews LCAs of integrated waste management systems with the aim of exploring how the scenarios to be compared are defined in the preliminary phase of an LCA. This critical review highlighted that various criteria, more or less subjective, are generally used for the definition of scenarios. Furthermore, the number of scenarios identified and compared is generally limited; this may entail that only the best option among a limited set of possibilities can be selected, instead of identifying the best of all possible combinations. As a result, the advisability of identifying an integrated life cycle-based methodological approach that allows finding the most environmentally sound scenario among all of those that are theoretically possible is stressed.

Suggested Citation

  • Valentino Tascione & Andrea Raggi, 2012. "Identification and Selection of Alternative Scenarios in LCA Studies of Integrated Waste Management Systems: A Review of Main Issues and Perspectives," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 4(10), pages 1-13, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:4:y:2012:i:10:p:2430-2442:d:20383
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/4/10/2430/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/4/10/2430/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Giulia Costa & Alessio Lieto & Francesco Lombardi, 2019. "LCA of a Consortium-Based MSW Management System to Quantify the Decrease in Environmental Impacts Achieved for Increasing Separate Collection Rates and Other Modifications," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-20, May.
    2. Ettore Trulli & Vincenzo Torretta & Massimo Raboni & Salvatore Masi, 2013. "Incineration of Pre-Treated Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) for Energy Co-Generation in a Non-Densely Populated Area," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 5(12), pages 1-14, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:4:y:2012:i:10:p:2430-2442:d:20383. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.