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Every product has a story. From raw substances used to create to the energy it consumes, where it ends when it is not long useful – every internship affects the environment. Assessment of a life cycle or LCA helps us estimate that the impact and identify areas for improvement during the product life cycle.
LCA helps businesses to understand the environmental trace of their products, processes or services across each content of their life cycle. The use of energy to water consumption will change critical data of LCA, which can drive a more sustainable decision.
What is the evaluation of the life cycle (LCA)?
The evaluation of the life cycle evaluates the entire life cycle of the product, including:
- Extraction of raw materials. One example is to obtain minerals, metals or natural fibers.
- Materials and product production – for example, transforming materials into fine products.
- Transport and distribution – including travel to shops, warehouses and customers.
- Use – for example, sources consumed when using the product.
- At the end of life-what happens with the product after use: for example recycling, reuse or landfill arrangement.
LCAS estimates the environmental impact at each stage and provides a picture of the product traces. Businesses rely on LCA to find out where the greatest impacts occur and find opportunities to reduce their impact on the environment.
* Notice that the examples of the Aboo are not exhausting and should be illustrative.
What estimates LCAS?
LCA exceeds only carbon tracks of the product to include topics such as water consumption, energy demand, resource exhaustion, waste production and pollution. Let’s take an example of a seemingly simple T -shirt to explore an example of what can be measured:
Global warming potential (GWP): LCAS estimates greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO₂) and methane (ch₄) that contribute to climate change. In T-shirts, these emissions occur at every stage-producing cotton to power factories and transport of a fine product.
Consumption of Blue Water (Water Using): LCAS Estimate how much fresh water is consumed during production and use of the product. For example, the production of sufficient cotton for one T -shirt may require thousands of liters of water, with another water used for dying, washing and cleaning the shirt throughout life.
Demand for primary energy (energy consumption): LCAS evaluates the energy sources used to produce, distribute and power supply. For T -shirt, this included running textile machines in the factory and shirt transport around the world.
Ecotoxicity (waste and pollution): Estimated LCA pollution that affects air, water and soil. In the production of T -shirts, chemical dyes and products can potentially pollute water sources and the shirt itself could eventually end up in a landfill.
The potential of abiotic exhaustion (exhaustion of resources): LCAS estimates the use of final sources such as metals, minerals and fossil fuels. In the example of our t -shirt, cotton cultivation exhausts soil nutrients, while producing synthetic fibers such as polyester related to fossil fuels.
By seizing business, capturing this whole range of environmental impacts to prefer more sustainable in its operations and product design.
Why LCA depends on businesses
LCA can be a powerful tool for managing innovation and reducing environmental impact.
They can offer tangible benefits for making business to meet their goals sustainability. By identifying the most source phases of the product life, companies can target environmental “hotspots” and implement changes, such as renewable energy to power production sites or transition to more sustainable materials that reduce their overall impact. This knowledge can control innovations, allowing designing products that are more energy efficient, sustainable and circular with reduced resource intensity and environmental impact.
For example, more than 80% of the environmental impact related to the product is estimated to design the design phase.1 LCA can help compare alternatives and understand compromises in choosing components, steps or processing process. By integrating LCA at the beginning of the design process can implement suttainability results.
Publishing LCA results helps to increase business transparency and promote environmental reporting. Sharing these reports creates confidence with customers, employees, investors and other parties and also adhere to compliance with the global standards of sustainability and reporting framework.
How are LCA doing?
LCA is a structured process that includes data collection at every stage of the product life cycle, environmental impact evaluation and interpretation of results to support initiatives such as pure zero and circular design.
LCA monitors worldwide standards, such as International Standardization Organizations (ISO) 14040 and 14044. There are other standards that are also based on ISO.
Cisco access to evaluate life cycle
In Cisco, LCA plays a key role in our efforts to estimate and minimize the impact of our products on the environment.
We recently announced that Cisco has published this assurance publicly and shared LCA for a range of our products in a part of sustainability sources on our website. In the last two years, Cisco has completed 23 LCA across 8 business units and plans to publish further rating across key product lines in 2025. Sharing these transparency results supports and demonstrates our obligation to measurable progress.
While many technology companies publish LCAS, Cisco is one of the first to produce them for network devices such as catalyst switches. Cisco’s sustainability teams continue to work with our colleagues from the whole company to produce these reports, and we plan to continue publishing that are available.
LCA are part of how we are holistic sustainability. LCA data supports our circular design strategy – develop products and resources that are reused, repeated and kept in circulation. By evaluating everything from the source of material to the display at the end of our lives, we gain critical knowledge that controls our design and innovation of products.
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