Life cycle assessment (LCA) is explored as an analytical tool in strategic environmental assessment (SEA), illustrated by case where a previously developed SEA process was applied to municipal energy planning in Sweden. The process integrated decision-making tools for scenario planning, public participation and environmental assessment. This article describes the use of LCA for environmental assessment in this context, with focus on methodology and practical experiences. While LCA provides a systematic framework for the environmental assessment and a wider systems perspective than what is required in SEA, LCA cannot address all aspects of environmental impact required, and therefore needs to be complemented by other tools. The integration of LCA with tools for public participation and scenario planning posed certain methodological challenges, but provided an innovative approach to designing the scope of the environmental assessment and defining and assessing alternatives.
1.1. Systems perspective in SEA
The EU Directive on the assessment of the effects of certain plans and programmes on the environment (Directive 2001/42/EC; the SEA Directive), as embodied in Swedish legislation (SFS 1998:808), requires SEA to be performed for certain municipal plans. An explicit purpose of the SEA Directive is to ensure that significant effects on the environment are taken into account in the preparation and adoption of plans and programs, but since it is not precise in terms of defining system boundaries of the environmental assessment, there is some room for interpretation.
In a review of municipal energy plans, which are subject to the requirement of SEA, Stenlund (2006) found that in general these plans rely on a narrow perspective and environmental assessments that are not very comprehensive. A narrow planning perspective brings with it a risk of environmental sub-optimisation, meaning the risk of reducing one impact at the cost of increasing another. This is the case in particular for plans that may influence activities far beyond the immediate technical and geographical boundaries of the plan itself, as is the case for municipal waste plans (Ekvall et al., 2007) and energy plans. The wide systems perspective of life cycle assessment (LCA) (ISO, 2006a and ISO, 2006b), ranging from “cradle to grave” and taking into account both direct and indirect impacts, should be valuable to the environmental assessment of SEA to avoid such sub-optimisation. This idea is supported by Tukker (2000), who recognises that “Including such secondary effects in an EIA,1 which may be crucial for a proper comparison of alternatives, requires a system approach that takes into account all relevant effects. This is, in fact, LCA.” Similar conclusions were presented by Nilsson et al., 2005 and Manuilova et al., 2009. A methodological framework for SEA by Finnveden et al. (2003) suggests the use of LCA for environmental assessment in SEA, but there are few documented practical examples of this. Nilsson et al., 2005 and Björklund and Finnveden, 2007 describe the use of LCA in SEA of a policy proposal for waste-to-energy taxation in Sweden. Another example is Salhofer et al. (2007), who describe the use of LCA in SEA of a regional waste management plan in Austria.
1.2. Objectives
This article introduces the use of LCA in SEA of municipal energy planning. A process for SEA in local energy planning was designed and tested in Finspång municipality in Sweden (Björklund et al., 2006, Ivner, 2009 and Ivner et al., 2010). The process is characterised by a combination of planning tools, including LCA, scenario planning, and participative tools. Its purpose was to improve energy planning in terms of legitimacy and ability to direct local energy systems towards less environmental impact, among other things by introducing a wider systems perspective through the use of LCA for environmental assessment.
Drawing on experiences from the previously designed and tested SEA process, the specific aim of this article is to describe how LCA can be implemented as an analytical tool for environmental assessment in SEA. Focus is on methodology and practical experiences of integrating LCA with other tools in the SEA process, and on conclusions on the role and contribution of LCA in this context. The LCA model and results are only briefly described for illustrative purposes.
There is still a need for methodological development and practical experience of environmental assessment in SEA. This paper explores the use of LCA for environmental assessment in SEA, and the integration of LCA with other tools in a previously developed and tested SEA processes. The process waste tested in the specific context of SEA in local energy planning, but some observations were made for LCA in SEA more generally. LCA works well in this context and can contribute to improved practice by providing a wide systems perspective and systematic framework. However, while LCA is more comprehensive than what is explicitly required for the environmental assessment in SEA, LCA cannot address all required aspects, and therefore needs to be complemented by other tools. Although the integration of LCA with participative tools and scenario planning posed certain methodological challenges, it resulted in an innovative approach to designing the scope of the environmental assessment and defining and assessing alternatives.
