Life-cycle impact ‘cradle to cradle’ of building assemblies

This paper proposes an integrated approach for the evaluation of the equivalent cradle-to-cradle life-cycle impact of building assemblies, including the energy, environmental and economic impacts. The application of this approach is exemplified with external walls of buildings. This integrated approach follows European standards: environmental performance is evaluated following a life-cycle assessment methodology; energy performance is gauged by the consumption of energy for heating and cooling; and the economic module is based on the whole-life costing methodology. The use of an environmental impact assessment method that converts the results of impact categories into an economic unit allows the comparison and selection of alternatives through the addition of the energy, environmental and economic life-cycle costs. The main advantage of this approach is the simultaneous comparison of the energy, environmental and economic life-cycle performance of alternatives (that do not have to be functionally equivalent) without the need to change their characteristics to make them comparable.