As a renewable raw material, straw bale represents a sustainable way of construction with minimal environmental impact. This paper focused on life cycle impact assessment of load-bearing straw bale residential building. Product stage from raw materials extraction to manufacture of construction materials was considered in the assessment including seven variations of straw bale. Construction materials were evaluated due to IMPACT 2002+ method. Both midpoint and endpoint impact categories were included. The results showed the importance of straw bale origin. Ecosystem quality impact of straw from extensively cultivated pastures was twenty times higher than that of intensive crop production, thus making a significant difference to an overall score of the construction. Results showed advantage of straw as a construction material particularly when used locally. In addition, significant contributions of other construction materials were identified.

The aim of the study is to point out the burden of passive wood-based buildings throughout the life cycle from the environmental point of view to better understand the consequences and importance of building design in Slovakia. The analysis was carried out according to the Life Cycle Assessment methodology. The results were calculated by the CML-IA baseline method. The impacts of the product stage and operational energy use were the highest throughout the considered life cycle. Substances contributing to eleven impact categories were identified. Foundations, especially foam glass, were found to bear the majority of the impact of the overall construction materials. The normalization category showed considerable impact on marine aquatic ecotoxicity mainly due to building energy consumption over the course of 50 years. Loads connected to the replacement stage were the third highest. The study also proved high demand on elements of photovoltaics.

This paper focused on the environmental performance of a nearly zero-energy wood-based educational building (NZEB-W) via the life cycle impact assessment (LCIA). It identifies the environmental impacts of construction materials and operational energy demands of the NZEB-W and compares them using the SimaPro 8 software with the IMPACT 2002+ method. The LCIA results from NZEB-W show that the overall environmental impact of construction materials (98.9 Pt) and 45 years operational energy demands (98.6 Pt) will be at the same level. Its overall environmental impact 197.75 Pt for 45 years is relatively small. NZEB-W has the greatest impact on the environment in the category of damage respiratory inorganics (34.5%), 419 kg PM2.5 eq from construction materials, and 271 kg PM2.5 eq from operational energy for 45 years; follows global warming (31.7%), 1.98 × 105 kg CO2 eq from construction materials, and 4.23 × 105 kg CO2 eq from operational energy for 45 years; and non-renewable energy (21.8%), 2.82 × 106 MJ primary from construction materials, and 3.73 × 106 MJ primary from operational energy for 45 years. As this environmental assessment shows, the material composition of construction materials compared to the energy consumption in the use phase is an essential element for understanding the life cycle impact of buildings.

The study focuses on a life cycle assessment of a wood-based residential building and evaluates the magnitude of individual construction components—foundations, flooring, peripheral wall, inner walls, ceiling, roof, windows, and doors—in terms of climate change; acidification; eutrophication; photochemical oxidation; depletion of abiotic elements and fossil fuels; and water scarcity categories within the system boundaries of the Product stage of the life cycle. The assessment was done using the SimaPro software and the ecoinvent database. The results pointed at the advantages of mass timber as a construction material and highlighted the significance in the type of insulation used. Foundations were found to bear the highest share of impact on photochemical oxidation reaching nearly 30% and depletion of fossil fuels accounting for about 25% of that impact. Peripheral wall was ranked the worst in terms of impact on acidification and eutrophication (more than 25% of both), depletion of elements (responsible for 50% of that impact), and had about 60% impact on water scarcity. After adding up carbon emissions and removals, the embodied impact of the whole construction on climate change was detected to be 8185.19 kg CO2 eq emissions which corresponded with 57.08 kg CO2 eq/m2 of gross internal area. A negative carbon composition of the construction was also set.

Climate change, the economic crisis and the current geopolitical situation are the biggest challenges of today. They participate to a fundamental extent in the creation of international policies. Renewable energy sources are thus gaining worldwide popularity. The paper deals with the assessment of the impact of four selected stages of the life cycle of a NZEB building on the environment in 13 impact categories. The analysis is performed in accordance with the LCA method using the attributional modeling approach. The results show the partial and total shift of impacts on the environment of photovoltaic energy storage in comparison with photovoltaic energy export across the building life cycle. Along the climate change impact reduction as a positive effect on the environment, a substantial impact increase is observed on the depletion of abiotic resources. Results also show the total environmental impact of the building life cycle, considering the use of stored energy in a lithium-based battery as being beneficial in most categories despite the relatively high impact increment in the stage of replacement.

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