TABLE 1.
Reviewed LCA reference documents, books, reports, and other relevant literature for life cycle interpretation definition and methodology
| Documents (references) | Type | Inclusion of definitions of interpretation phase? | Brief description of content (relevant to interpretation) |
|---|---|---|---|
| ISO Standards 14040–44 (ISO, 2000, 2006a, 2006b) | Reference documents | Yes | Provides overarching guidance and requirements, including provision of the step-wise approach |
| ILCD Handbook—LCA Detailed Guidance (EC-JRC 2010) | Reference document | Yes | Provides overarching guidance and requirements, including provision of the step-wise approach |
| Barthel, Fava, James, Hardwick, and Khan (2017) | Reference document | No | Detailed guidance to perform hotspot analysis studies. Includes eight steps for study conduct, including three of them (steps 4–6) relating to interpretation and validation of the results. Focus on hotspot analysis and identification of significant impacts |
| EC (2018a, 2018b) | Reference documents | No | Environmental Footprint Category Rules (PEFCRs) guidance document providing detailed procedures and specifications for performing assessments in different sectors, including methods for hotspot analysis and identification of significant impacts |
| Vigon et al. (1994) | Book | No (dated pre-ISO-14040) | Addresses lifecycle inventory analysis, including model development and evaluation of data issues (quality, specificity, etc.) |
| Ciambrone (1997) | Book | No (dated pre-ISO-14040) | Includes a succinct section dedicated to interpretation of LCA results, as part of the life cycle framework |
| Wenzel, Hauschild, and Alting (1997) | Book | No (dated pre-ISO-14040) | Describes need and method to conduct interpretation of results together with uncertainty and sensitivity analysis |
| Guinée (2002) | Book | Yes | Includes dedicated chapters on interpretation from practical to methodological point of view, including step-wise approach and detailed guidelines for applying specific methods |
| Heijungs and Suh (2002) | Book | Yes | Strong focus on inventory analysis with a subchapter dedicated to interpretation, describing several methods to perform quantitative uncertainty analysis |
| Baumann and Tillman (2004) | Book | Yes | Includes dedicated chapter on interpretation and presentation of results, differentiating quantitative and qualitative interpretation and testing of result robustness |
| Horne, Grant, and Verghese (2009) | Book | No | Reflections on LCA practice, briefly touching upon interpretation of results as part of LCA framework presentation (LCA methodological guidance being outside scope of the book) |
| Curran (2012) | Book | Yes | Describes definition and overarching methodological guidance for interpretation of LCIA results |
| Klopffer and Grahl (2014) | Book | Yes | Includes dedicated chapter on interpretation and critical review, detailing a number of mathematical and non-numerical methods, supported by an illustrative case study |
| Matthews, Hendrickson, and Matthews (2016) | Book | Yes | Includes chapters dedicated to specific methods or groups of methods supporting interpretation, for example, uncertainty assessment, structural path analysis, etc. |
| Jolliet, Saadé-Sbeih, Shaked, Jolliet, and Crettaz (2016) | Book | Yes | Includes dedicated chapter on interpretation, detailing several steps and aspects to check and evaluate, including a detailed part on quality control and uncertainty assessments |
| Hauschild, Rosenbaum, and Olsen (2018a) | Book | Yes | Includes dedicated chapters on interpretation (Hauschild et al., 2018b), uncertainty and sensitivity analysis (Rosenbaum, Georgiadis, & Fantke, 2018), and practical cookbook (Hauschild & Bjørn, 2018) |
| Ciroth (2017) | Book chapter | Yes | Describes the interactions between goal and scope definition phase and interpretation phase succinctly. Part of Curran (2017), detailing goal and scope definition phase |
| Zamagni et al. (2008) | Technical report | No | Provides generic guidance to critical review of LCA studies, including a chapter on interpretation |
| Zampori et al. (2016) | Technical report | No | Provides practical guidance for conducting interpretation with examples and case studies |
| Skone (2000) | Scientific paper | Yes | Discusses the concept of life cycle interpretation, and steps to carry it out |
| Heijungs and Kleijn (2001) | Scientific paper | No | Focus on the numerical approaches in interpretation (contribution analysis, perturbation analysis, etc.) |
| Finnveden et al. (2009) | Scientific paper | No | Touches upon the topic when presenting an overview of LCA; strong focus on uncertainty analysis |
| Guinée et al. (2011) | Scientific paper | No | Touches upon the topic when presenting an overview of LCA |
| Weidema (2019) | Scientific paper | No | Provides detailed procedure and guidance for performing the consistency check |