Assessing the environmental impact of materials processing techniques using an analytical hierarchy process method

Although many life cycle assessment (LCA) software tools are available, mos t tools can either address the needs of a specific produce or a general ind ustry range, but not both. This calls for the development of an easy-to-use and interactive Pre-LCA tool that would allow users to customise and impro ve flexibility and efficiency. The analytic hierarchy process (AHP) method uses established procedures to capture the best rank from judgements, throu gh the weighting and synthesising of the decision process, into a hierarchy which is compatible with a network synthesised with various dependencies. It compares alternatives, one at a time, in the context of priorities. For this research, the AI IP method is used to derive a single environmental sc ore based on process emissions for each of the products or alternatives eva luated. Based on these environmental scores, these products can be ranked w ith respect to their environmental merits. The AHP method is incorporated i nto the Pre-LCA tool to assign accurate environmental scores to products. T his paper discusses this AHP model in the Pre-LCA system developed. The dev eloped AHP model has been applied to a case study, which is a comparative s tudy on polystyrene and porcelain plates. The results show that the develop ed system is able to provide sound evaluation. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B. V. All rights reserved.