Cradle-to-gate life cycle assessment defines all impacts of a material or product from all of its components and processes to produce a functional unit of the material or product.
Downcycling is the recycling of a material into a material of lesser quality. The terms downcycle and downcycling were first used by Reiner Pilz of Pilz GmbH and Thornton Kay of Salvo Llp in 1993, along with the terms upcycle and upcycling. This term was…
Building for Environmental and Economic Sustainability, developed by the NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) Building and Fire Research Laboratory, http://www.bfrl.nist.gov/oae/software/bees/bees.html
New Zealand Green Building Council, http://www.nzgbc.org.nz.The New Zealand Green Building Council is an industry organisation dedicated to accelerating the development and adoption of market-based green building practices.
life cycle assessment (LCA) is the compilation and evaluation of the inputs, outputs and the potential environmental impacts of a product system throughout its life cycle.
This is raw material directly used in the production of goods. This is not the same as fuel used to power the production process as this only indirectly contributes to the production of goods.
Global Warming Potentials (GWP) are calculated as the ratio of the radiative forcing of one kilogramme of greenhouse gas emitted to the atmosphere to that from one kilogramme of carbon dioxide over a period of time (e.g. 100 years).