Social and environmental life cycle assessment (SELCA): Approach and methodological development

Social and Environmental Life Cycle Assessment (SELCA) is an analytical tool for profiling and evaluating the interaction between the social and technologicalsystemswithin the lifecycle of given service. Environmental Life CycleAssessment(ELCA)and Social Life CycleAssessment{SLCA}are undertakenwith their own objectives using independent methodologies.Integrating the outcomes of the two assessments provides more comprehensiveand insightful descriptions of the potential impactsof a lifecycle, including the key social factors through whichthe lifecycleis sustainedand modified. The SELCAapproach is outlined usingthe examplesof two fuel cycles of coal and waste in energy-generation. There are some methodological issues in combining ELCA and SLCA which we highlight in order to encourage further work on the integration of environmental and social processesin LCA.