Estimating the environmental impact of emerging technologies at different stages of development is uncertain but necessary to guide investment, research, and development. Here, we propose a systematic procedure to assess the future impacts of emerging technologies. In the technology development stage (technology readiness level < 9), the recommended experience mechanisms to take into account are (a) process changes, (b) size scaling effects, and (c) process synergies. These developments can be based on previous experience with similar technologies or quantified through regression or engineering dimension calculations. In the industrial development phase, (d) industrial learning, based on experience curves or roadmaps, and (e) external developments should be included. External developments, such as changes in the electricity mix can be included with information from integrated assessment models. We show the applicability of our approach with the greenhouse gas (GHG) footprint evaluation for the production of copper indium gallium (di)selenide (CIGS) photovoltaic laminate. We found that the GHG footprint per kilowatt peak of produced CIGS laminate is expected to decrease by 83% going from pilot to mature industrial scale production with the largest decrease being due to expected process changes. The feasibility of applying our approach in practice would greatly benefit from the development of a database containing information on size scaling and experience rates for a wide variety of materials, products, and technologies.

Herein, we present our results on the development of a waste minimized protocol for the synthesis of 2-arylbenzoxazoles in continuous flow by combining safe solvent and heterogeneous manganese-based catalyst.

This paper summarizes the 76th LCA Discussion Forum end its main findings. Main issues when addressing emerging technologies identified were: the lack of primary data, the need for (shared) future background scenarios and (guidlines for) a common methodology. The following recommendations have been derived by the organizers: 1) Specific foreground inventories are always tailor-made, but consistency can be improved through lists of mandatory considerations. 2) Continue sharing (future) technology data and proxy processes, that can be readily replicated to new studies and assist in developing inventories. 3) Streamline and unify the process of including scenarios for background systems. New approaches may provide first important solutions to efficiently include consistent future scenarios in prospective LCA.

The current debate on the sustainability of bio-based products questions the environmental benefits of replacing fossil- by bio-resources. Here, we systematically analyzed the environmental trade-offs of 86 emerging bio-based materials compared to their fossil counterparts. Although greenhouse gas (GHG) life cycle emissions for emerging bio-based products are on average 47% lower (38-54%; 95% confidence interval), we found a large variation between individual bio-based products with none of them reaching net-zero emissions. Grouped in product-categories, our findings indicate that biorefinery products may have the highest predicted GHG reduction of 73% (50, 85%) and biofibers the lowest (29%; -61, 30%). Only for eutrophication we found statistical evidence for an increase in footprint (359%; 109-906%), indicating that environmental trade-offs should not be overlooked. Our findings imply that the environmental sustainability of bio-based products should be evaluated on an individual product basis and that more radical product developments are required to reach climate-neutral targets.