Dictionary

Abiotic depletion is an impact category concerned with the use or depletion of non-living natural resources such as minerals, metals or fossil resources.

Acidification potential is an impact category estimating the contribution of emissions to acidifying effects on soils, water bodies or ecosystems.

The conversion of existing buildings or structures to new uses, preserving heritage value and avoiding the demolition waste and embodied carbon of new construction.

Allocation is the partitioning of inputs, outputs or impacts among co-products, functions or systems in an assessment.

A lightweight, indefinitely recyclable metal whose primary production is highly energy- and emissions-intensive, making recycled content the central lever for its sustainability.

Anaerobic digestion is a biological process in which microorganisms break down organic material without oxygen, producing biogas and digestate.

A low-carbon concrete in which fly ash — a by-product of coal combustion — replaces part or most of the Portland cement, cutting embodied emissions and diverting industrial waste.

A green chemistry metric measuring what share of the atoms in the reactants ends up in the desired product — the rest becomes waste by design.

Attributional LCA is a life cycle assessment approach that describes the environmental impacts associated with a product system under defined average or existing conditions.

An LCA approach that credits a product system for the conventional production it displaces — e.g. recycling credited with avoided virgin material production — instead of allocating impacts between co-products.

The background system is the set of upstream or supporting processes in an assessment that are usually modelled using databases or secondary data.

A fast-growing grass harvested without replanting, used as a rapidly renewable, carbon-storing alternative to timber, plastics and steel in construction and products.

A mandatory digital record for each battery sold in the EU — linked by QR code — carrying identity, chemistry, carbon footprint, state-of-health and chain-of-custody data from February 2027.

The reuse of electric vehicle batteries — typically retired from vehicles at 70–80% of original capacity — in less demanding stationary applications before recycling.

The principal ore of aluminium — a reddish rock refined into alumina — whose mining and processing geography is reshaping the aluminium supply chain.

The share of a product derived from biomass rather than fossil resources, verified by radiocarbon testing — about feedstock origin, not biodegradability.

A bio-based material is made wholly or partly from biological resources rather than fossil-derived inputs.

A polymer made wholly or partly from biomass rather than fossil feedstock — a sourcing property that says nothing, by itself, about whether the material biodegrades.

Biodegradable means a material can be broken down by biological processes, but the claim is incomplete without conditions, timeframe and environment.

The part of the economy using renewable biological resources — plants, animals, microorganisms — to produce food, materials, chemicals and energy, increasingly framed by sustainability principles.

Biogenic carbon is carbon contained in or released from biological material such as plants, biomass or soil organic matter.

Organic, non-fossil material of biological origin — plants, animals, residues and organic waste — used as a material and energy feedstock.

Bioplastic is a broad term for plastics that are bio-based, biodegradable, or both, depending on the specific material and claim.

The fine, dark powder of crushed lithium-ion battery cells — a concentrated mix of lithium, cobalt, nickel, manganese and graphite that is the feedstock of battery recycling.

A woven polypropylene container for 500–2,000 kg of dry bulk goods — widely reused and recyclable, and the subject of a closed-loop reconditioning economy in industrial supply chains.

The practice of turning one facility's wastes into another's raw materials through organised networks — the operational core of industrial symbiosis.

Thermally activated clay used to replace a large share of clinker in cement — the basis of LC3 blends that cut cement CO₂ emissions by up to 40%.

Carbon handprint is a claimed positive climate contribution or avoided-emissions effect associated with a product, service or action compared with an alternative.

The metal-oxide compounds in a battery cathode — NMC, LFP, LCO and others — that dominate battery cost, performance and critical-minerals exposure.

Fibres of cellulose broken down to nanometre scale — stronger than steel by weight, biodegradable, and a rising substitute for plastics in packaging and composites.

The binding agent of concrete — and one of the largest industrial CO₂ sources, responsible for roughly 7–8% of global anthropogenic emissions.

A characterization factor is a coefficient used in life cycle impact assessment to convert an inventory flow into a common impact category indicator.

A metric quantifying the total mass of chemicals of high concern in a company's products, operations and supply chain — pioneered by the Chemical Footprint Project.

Chemical recycling is the processing of materials through chemical or thermal methods intended to break them into feedstocks, monomers or other inputs for new production.

A business model that creates and captures value by keeping products and materials in use — through circular supplies, recovery, life extension, sharing or product-as-a-service.

Designing products, services and systems so that waste and pollution are eliminated, materials circulate at their highest value, and nature is regenerated.

A circular economy is an economic model that aims to keep products, materials and resources in use for longer while reducing waste and virgin resource extraction.

The EU's headline circularity indicator — the share of an economy's total material use that is met by recycled materials rather than primary extraction.

An emerging vision term extending the circular economy beyond materials and business models to whole-of-society transformation, including justice, governance and wellbeing.

Closed-loop recycling is recycling in which material is recovered and used again in the same or a closely equivalent product system.

A natural building material made from subsoil, water and fibrous organic material such as straw, formed by hand into monolithic walls.

A critical metal for lithium-ion batteries and superalloys whose supply chain carries severe human-rights and environmental risks.

The uninterrupted temperature-controlled supply chain that preserves perishable food, vaccines and medicines from production to consumption.

An economic model in which people access goods and services through sharing, swapping, renting or lending rather than individual ownership.

A comparative assertion is a claim that one product, service or system has better or worse environmental performance than another.

A certified claim that a material will biodegrade and disintegrate into compost under specified composting conditions within set timeframes.

Composting is the controlled biological decomposition of organic material into a soil-like amendment under suitable conditions.

Consequential LCA is a life cycle assessment approach that estimates environmental consequences caused by a decision or change in demand.

A highly conductive metal described by the IEA as the cornerstone of all electricity-related technologies, central to electrification and grid expansion.

The renewable bark of the cork oak, harvested every nine to twelve years without felling the tree, from Mediterranean montado and dehesa landscapes.

Cradle to cradle describes an approach in which materials are intended to circulate safely in biological or technical cycles rather than become waste.

Cradle to gate describes a product boundary from raw material extraction through production up to the factory gate, excluding later use and end-of-life stages.

Cradle to grave describes a product boundary from raw material extraction through production, use and end-of-life treatment.

Minerals essential to clean-energy technologies and modern economies whose supply chains are concentrated and vulnerable to disruption.

Critical raw materials are materials considered economically important and exposed to supply risk within a particular policy, industry or technology context.

An engineered mass-timber panel of crosswise-glued lumber layers, used as a low-carbon structural alternative to concrete and steel.

An LCA indicator quantifying the total primary energy used across a product's entire life cycle, often used as a proxy for environmental burden.

Cut-off criteria are rules for deciding which inputs, outputs or processes may be excluded from an assessment because they are below stated thresholds or relevance limits.

A data quality indicator is a measure or rating used to describe the reliability, representativeness, completeness or precision of data used in an assessment.

The careful, systematic dismantling of buildings to recover materials for reuse — the circular alternative to demolition.

The proposed extraction of minerals — polymetallic nodules, sulphides and cobalt-rich crusts — from the ocean floor, governed in international waters by the International Seabed Authority.

Dematerialization is the reduction of material use needed to deliver a product, service or function.

A deposit return scheme is a system in which a refundable deposit is charged on a product or container and returned when it is brought back for collection.

Design for disassembly is the practice of designing products so components and materials can be separated more easily for repair, reuse, recycling or recovery.

A systematic product-design methodology that builds environmental considerations in from the concept stage, when most impacts are still undecided.

Design for recycling is the practice of designing products and packaging so materials can be effectively collected, sorted and recycled.

Downcycling is recycling that turns a material into a lower-value or lower-performance application than its original use.

Tangible products with an average useful life of at least three years — cars, appliances, furniture — central to circular-economy design strategies.

Roger Sheldon's green-chemistry metric: the mass of waste produced per mass of desired product — the lower, the cleaner the process.

The systematic integration of environmental aspects into product design and development to reduce adverse impacts across the whole life cycle (ISO 14006).

Ecoinvent is a life cycle inventory database used by practitioners to model environmental flows for products, materials and processes.

Economic allocation is allocation based on the relative economic value of co-products or outputs.

Ecotoxicity is the potential for substances or emissions to cause harmful effects in ecosystems.

An endpoint indicator is an impact measure that estimates damage at a final area of protection such as human health, ecosystem quality or resource availability.

An Environmental Product Declaration is a standardised document that communicates quantified environmental information for a product, usually based on life cycle assessment and product category rules.

Eutrophication potential is an impact category estimating the contribution of nutrient emissions to excessive enrichment of water or land ecosystems.

Feedstock is a raw material or input used in a production, recycling, energy or conversion process.

The foreground system is the part of an assessment that is most directly controlled, specified or studied by the practitioner or organisation.

A functional unit is the quantified function of a product system used as the reference basis for comparison in life cycle assessment.

The GHG Protocol Product Standard is a method for accounting and reporting greenhouse gas emissions associated with a product over its life cycle.

Home compostable means a material is intended to break down in domestic composting conditions, which are usually less controlled than industrial facilities.

Hotspot analysis is the process of identifying the stages, processes, materials or assumptions that contribute most to an environmental impact result.

Human toxicity is the potential for substances or emissions to cause harmful effects on human health.

Industrially compostable means a material is designed to break down in controlled industrial composting conditions within specified parameters.

ISO 14040 is a standard that sets principles and framework requirements for life cycle assessment.

ISO 14044 is a standard that sets requirements and guidelines for life cycle assessment practice.

ISO 14067 is a standard for quantifying and reporting the carbon footprint of products.

Land footprint is an assessment of land occupation, transformation or use associated with a product, organisation, process or activity.

Land use change emissions are greenhouse gas emissions associated with changes in land cover or land management, such as conversion of forest to agriculture.

Landfill diversion is the redirection of waste away from landfill toward reuse, recycling, composting, recovery or other treatment routes.

Life cycle assessment is a method for evaluating environmental impacts associated with a product, service or system across defined life-cycle stages.

Life cycle impact assessment is the stage of life cycle assessment that translates inventory data into potential environmental impact categories.

Life cycle inventory is the data-collection stage of life cycle assessment that quantifies inputs, outputs and emissions for the assessed system.

A linear economy is a take-make-use-dispose model in which resources are extracted, made into products, used and then discarded.

Material footprint is a measure of the material resources used or mobilised to support consumption, production or an activity.

Material intensity is the amount of material used or required per unit of product, service, revenue, output or function.

Material recovery is the collection, sorting or processing of discarded materials so they can be reused, recycled or otherwise returned to productive use.

Mechanical recycling is the processing of materials through physical methods such as sorting, washing, shredding, melting or re-forming without intentionally changing their chemical structure.

Microplastics are small plastic particles or fragments, commonly understood as being below a defined size threshold, that can persist in the environment.

In life cycle assessment, an impact indicator measured partway along the cause-effect chain — such as global warming potential — before aggregation into endpoint damages.

A midpoint indicator is an impact category measure located partway along an environmental cause-effect chain, before final damage outcomes.

Normalization is an optional life cycle impact assessment step that expresses impact results relative to a reference value or context.

Open-loop recycling is recycling in which recovered material is used in a different product system or application from its original use.

Organisation Environmental Footprint is a European method for assessing environmental performance at organisation level across relevant activities and life-cycle aspects.

Ozone depletion potential is an impact category estimating the contribution of emissions to depletion of the stratospheric ozone layer.

Photochemical ozone formation is an impact category estimating the formation of ground-level ozone or smog from precursor emissions.

Physical allocation is allocation based on a physical relationship such as mass, energy content or another measurable property.

Planned obsolescence is the design or commercial practice of limiting a product's useful life or desirability to encourage replacement.

Post-consumer recycled material is recovered from products or packaging after use by households, businesses or other end users.

Post-industrial recycled material is recovered from manufacturing or industrial processes before reaching a final consumer.

Primary data is data collected directly from the specific process, site, supplier or activity being assessed.

Product Category Rules are specific rules that define how environmental product declarations or similar product assessments should be prepared for a product category.

Product Environmental Footprint is a European method for assessing and communicating the environmental performance of products across life-cycle stages.

Product lifetime extension is the use of design, maintenance, repair, reuse or business models to keep a product in service for longer.

Product-as-a-service is a business model in which users access a product's function through service, leasing or subscription rather than owning the product outright.

Proxy data is substitute data used when direct or representative data is unavailable.

Recycled content is the proportion of a product or material made from recovered material rather than virgin material.

Recycling is the processing of waste materials into materials or products that can be used again.

Reference flow is the amount of product, material or service needed to fulfil the functional unit in a life cycle assessment.

Refurbishment is the process of restoring, cleaning, updating or repairing a used product so it can be used again.