LCA & Sabatier’s framework

LCAs are a tool for assessing the environmental impact of products. Think up four ways in which government can increase the use of LCAs through external control and setting boundary conditions.

Use Sabatier’s framework to assess the potential effectiveness of external control vis-a-vis other options.



(1).increase the use of LCAs

Life-cycle assessment (LCA, also known as life-cycle analysis, ecobalance, and cradle-to-grave analysis)is a technique to assess environmental impacts associated with all the stages of a product's life from cradle to grave (i.e., from raw material extraction through materials processing, manufacture, distribution, use, repair and maintenance, and disposal or recycling). LCAs can help avoid a narrow outlook on environmental concerns by:

· Compiling an inventory of relevant energy and material inputs and environmental releases;

· Evaluating the potential impacts associated with identified inputs and releases;

· Interpreting the results to help make a more informed decision.

The four ways in which government can increase the use of LCAs through external control and setting boundary conditions are, in my opinion:

1. The government could create a LCA controlling authority and make it mandatory for companies to comply with the law within a specific year. Failure to comply could result in fines or temporarily shutting down the company until this can demonstrate it has done the necessary analysis.



2.The government can make subsidies for companies which use the LCA method for environmental impact analysis. By doing this, the government can motivate firms to act according to the goals of the government if we assume that monetary value is a motivational factor. This is a way of setting boundary condition that makes the use of LCAs more desirable.

3. The Government can alter market conditions, giving incentives to industries in order for them to create job positions which functions will be analyzing environmental impacts of the production, using LCA analysis and other models of life cycle thinking. The Government will give a subsidy for the payment of that position.



4.Create gradually an open source database of all LCAs. The database of LCA is enormous, which needs sufficient cooperation between companies and government and timely update. In this way the diffusion of necessary information is easier.


(2)Sabatier’s framework





Tractability of the problem

The target group in case of the external control would be group of companies that have a production line around a product or a service and may potentially cause environmental impacts. In this group as the Life Cycle Thinking proposes, it is taken into account the whole system of the actors involved directly or indirectly in each event or stage all the way from cradle to death of the product. Thus it is easily realized that the target group is really broad covering nearly the total of industrial actors. The large number of actors involved makes the problem difficult to tackle as information intensity and reliability.



Ability of statute to structure implementation

The implementation of boundary conditions doesn’t ensure that the desired effect of the policy actually takes place. Therefore, in my opinion, the government plays an important role. The external control policies will have a greater effect on policy objectives than creating boundary conditions



Non-statutory variables affecting implementation

The external control policies have the potential to gather media attention. The pressure from the public support and media plays a vital role. And also in order to a good perception of the use of LCA, the Government should develop media campaigns about its use and benefits.



In conclusion,. the cooperation between companies and government is of great importance. A combination of the legislative state control and setting boundaries would be the best way to achieve increase the use of LCAs.