Aggregated indicator to assess land use impacts in life cycle assessment (LCA) based on the economic value of ecosystem services

Cao, Viêt; Margni, Manuele; Favis, Basil D.; Deschênes, Louise

doi:10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.01.041

Cited by 76 publications

(62 citation statements)

References 35 publications

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“…LUCC and the resulting changes in ecosystem services have become a research hotspot, and some studies have attempted to evaluate the potential impacts of LUCC on ecosystem services [56][57][58]. Future ecosystem services have been assessed by using two models.…”

Section: Generality Of Modelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Carbon Dynamics in the Northeastern Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau from 1990 to 2030 Using Landsat Land Use/Cover Change Data

Gong

Guldmann

et al. 2020

Remote Sensing

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Land use/cover change (LUCC) has an important impact on the terrestrial carbon cycle. The spatial distribution of regional carbon reserves can provide the scientific basis for the management of ecosystem carbon storage and the formulation of ecological and environmental policies. This paper proposes a method combining the CA-based FLUS model and the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Trade-offs (InVEST) model to assess the temporal and spatial changes in ecosystem carbon storage due to land-use changes over 1990–2015 in the Qinghai Lake Basin (QLB). Furthermore, future ecosystem carbon storage is simulated and evaluated over 2020–2030 under three scenarios of natural growth (NG), cropland protection (CP), and ecological protection (EP). The long-term spatial variations in carbon storage in the QLB are discussed. The results show that: (1) Carbon storage in the QLB decreased at first (1990–2000) and increased later (2000–2010), with total carbon storage increasing by 1.60 Tg C (Teragram: a unit of mass equal to 1012 g). From 2010 to 2015, carbon storage displayed a downward trend, with a sharp decrease in wetlands and croplands as the main cause; (2) Under the NG scenario, carbon reserves decrease by 0.69 Tg C over 2020–2030. These reserves increase significantly by 6.77 Tg C and 7.54 Tg C under the CP and EP scenarios, respectively, thus promoting the benign development of the regional ecological environment. This study improves our understanding on the impact of land-use change on carbon storage for the QLB in the northeastern Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau (QTP).

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Section: Generality Of Modelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Carbon Dynamics in the Northeastern Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau from 1990 to 2030 Using Landsat Land Use/Cover Change Data

Gong

Guldmann

et al. 2020

Remote Sensing

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“…The assessment of ecosystem services is usually composed of two steps: quantification of ecosystem services provided through ecosystem functions (functional quantification) and its evaluation by measuring benefits of these ecosystem services to the society [18]. Because the latter is performed using economic evaluation methods [28,29], here, models only used in the former step are discussed due to the current study focuses on points that express differences in management practices.…”

Section: Models For Quantifying Ecosystem Servicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reconciling Life Cycle Environmental Impacts with Ecosystem Services: A Management Perspective on Agricultural Land Use

et al. 2018

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Impacts on ecosystem services that are related to agricultural land use greatly differ depending on management practices employed. This study aimed to reveal issues associated with evaluating ecosystem services related to land use at the management level during life cycle assessment (LCA) and to consider future challenges. Firstly, a relationship between agricultural ecosystem services and management practices was outlined. Then, a survey was performed to disclose the current status of assessment of impact of land use in agricultural LCA case studies that compared between different management practices. In addition, this study also investigated how management practices have been differently considered by factors that characterize ecosystem services that are related to land use. The results show that the number of agricultural LCA cases where land use impacts instead of land areas were assessed was still small. The results of limited LCA case studies, which using factors could differentiate between various management practices, suggest that although organic farming methods have been employed over large land areas, lower impact may be caused by agricultural land use. For factors developed in existing research, services related to soil quality, and some of the regulatory services were considered, those unique to agriculture were missing. Although most of factors were calculated at levels of intensity or land use type, some of them were based on a process-based model that could consider management practices. In the future, factors that characterize the impacts of land use on ecosystem services, such as carbon storage and erosion prevention, will need to be calculated at the management level. For ecosystem services, such as habitat conservation and pollination, further efforts in accumulating evaluation case studies that collect and accumulate foreground data are important.

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“…Moreover, stakeholders may have different perceptions and preferences regarding the importance of flora, fauna and abiotic factors of biodiversity, making an indicator of biodiversity difficult to assess in the decision-making process. This problem could be avoided by using the area of protection as a proxy (Cao et al 2015a) to avoid the risk of losing biodiversity due to lack of understanding about ecosystem functions. Our current knowledge of ecosystem functions and biodiversity has large gaps and includes imperfect information.…”

Section: Sustainability Indicators Of the Forest Bioeconomy Ecologicamentioning

confidence: 99%

Indicators and tools for assessing sustainability impacts of the forest bioeconomy

et al. 2017

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The sustainable use of renewable resources has become an important issue worldwide in the move towards a less fossil-fuel-intensive future. Mainstream method for fulfilling this aim is to increase the share of renewable energy and materials to substitute fossil fuels and to become fully independent from fossil fuels over the long-term. However, the environmental sustainability of this endeavor has been questioned. In addition, economic and social sustainability issues are also much debated topics in this particular context. Forest resources are often thought to contribute partially to achieving a so-called "carbon-neutral society". In this review, we discuss sustainability issues of using forest biomass. We present several sustainability indicators for ecological, economic and social dimensions and discuss the issues in applying them in sustainability impact assessments (SIAs). We also present a number of tools and methods previously used in conducting SIAs. We approach our study from the perspective of the Finnish forestry; in addition, various aspects regarding the application of SIAs in a broader context are also presented. One of the key conclusions of the study is that although sufficient data are available to measure many indicators accurately, the impacts may be very difficult to assess (e.g. impact of greenhouse gases on biodiversity) for conducting a holistic SIA. Furthermore, some indicators, such as "biodiversity", are difficult to quantify in the first place. Therefore, a mix of different methods, such as Multi-criteria Assessment, Life-cycle Assessment or Cost-Benefit Analysis, as well as different approaches (e.g. thresholds and strong/weak sustainability) are needed in aggregating the results of the impacts. SIAs are important in supporting and improving the acceptability of decision-making, but a certain degree of uncertainty will always have to be tolerated. Highlights:•Forest bioeconomy involves a range of multidimensional impacts.•A variety of methods exist to assess and evaluate sustainability.•Social sustainability is the most case-specific dimension to assess.•Indicators used in SIAs need case-specific considerations.•More consistency is needed regarding the concept and terminology of sustainability.

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Aggregated indicator to assess land use impacts in life cycle assessment (LCA) based on the economic value of ecosystem services

Cited by 76 publications

References 35 publications

Carbon Dynamics in the Northeastern Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau from 1990 to 2030 Using Landsat Land Use/Cover Change Data

Carbon Dynamics in the Northeastern Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau from 1990 to 2030 Using Landsat Land Use/Cover Change Data

Reconciling Life Cycle Environmental Impacts with Ecosystem Services: A Management Perspective on Agricultural Land Use

Indicators and tools for assessing sustainability impacts of the forest bioeconomy

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