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The life cycle design framework developed at the University of Michigan was applied by AlliedSignal to improve the manufacture, use, and end-of-life management of automobile oil filters. Three oil filter designs were investigated: a conventional spin-on filter which is a single-use product, a cartridge filter consisting of a reusable housing and a replacement cartridge, and a cleanable design which uses a reusable housing and cleanable filter element. Environmental, cost, performance, and legal requirements were developed using a matrix tool and tradeoffs between these requirements were studied. These design criteria are presented along with results from an analysis of user life cycle costs and a simplified life cycle energy analysis. Key elements of the life cycle design framework, which is based on systems analysis, multiobjective analysis, and multistakeholder participation, are also described.

Rolling stock is an asset with a long life cycle which binds a lot of investment capital and brings about high operating costs. A procedure has now been developed which makes it possible to portray i.e. „design” today's long-range effect on the entire life cycle of decisions which must be made today in regard to this investment capital. This „Life Cycle Design” is worked out via a formal system consisting of models and predictions. Its measure is the so-called „Life Cycle Cost”. With the help of the Life Cycle Design various formal solutions can be found for current long-term problems. Based on this an optimal decision can then be made.

In 1998 the United States Automotive Materials Partnership published the life cycle inventory of a generic US family sedan. Several years later, researchers at the University of Michigan expanded this analysis to consider the dynamic replacement decisions over the vehicle lifetime that would optimize energy and emissions performance of generic family sedan ownership. The present study provides further analysis of this vehicle by examining the life cycle cost profile for generic sedan ownership and determining the optimal replacement intervals for this vehicle based on economics. Life cycle cost for a generic vehicle was estimated as $0.37/mile for a ten year life cycle and $0.31/mile for a twenty year life cycle. This study found that while less than 10% of the generic vehicle life cycle energy (20 year) is consumed during material production and manufacturing, 43% of the total life cycle cost is associated with vehicle purchase and depreciation.

A life cycle energy model for representing electric (EV) and internal combustion energy (TCV) vehicles is presented. The full life cycle energy for each vehicle is computed including the material production, vehicle assembly, operation, maintenance, delivery, scrapping and recycling contributions. It is found that the modelled electric vehicle (sodium sulphur battery system) consumes 24% less life cycle energy than a functionally equivalent (in carrying capacity and life time distance) gasoline powered internal combustion energy vehicle. In fact, the ICV would have to operate at 50 MPG to be as operationally energy efficient as the EV. However, it should be noted that the EV is not the performance equivalent of the ICV; the former has a lower acceleration, a shorter range, a much longer “refueling time”, and a considerably greater cost. Overall, atmospheric emissions for the EV are lower than those for the ICV, though the former does generate more acid rain gases.

The automobile is one of the main means of transportation in urban areas and it is responsible for a large amount of environmental impacts. Much has been talked about the consequences brought by the automobile during its life time. In this study, it is evaluated the consumption of the energy during the life cycle of the material in an automobile considering the materials extraction, the products of the parts, the automobile assembling, the use of the automobile and the recycling of materials. The period of time of the use of the automobile is varied as well as the efficiency. The main purpose of developing this study is to analyse the importance of the stage of the use of the automobile in the whole life cycle of the material in terms of energy requirements. The results show the energy consumption for the different efficiencies and automobile exchanges. It is interesting to notice that the augmentation of the life of the automobile from nowadays average (150.000 km) brings advantages.

Advanced lightweight materials are increasingly being incorporated into new vehicle designs by automakers to enhance performance and assist in complying with increasing requirements of corporate average fuel economy standards. To assess the primary energy and carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) implications of vehicle designs utilizing these materials, this study examines the potential life cycle impacts of two lightweight material alternative vehicle designs, i.e., steel and aluminum of a typical passenger vehicle operated today in North America. LCA for three common alternative lightweight vehicle designs are evaluated: current production (“Baseline”), an advanced high strength steel and aluminum design (“LWSV”), and an aluminum-intensive design (AIV). This study focuses on body-in-white and closures since these are the largest automotive systems by weight accounting for approximately 40% of total curb weight of a typical passenger vehicle.

New design factors have to be considered in the selection of materials to be used in automobiles as a result of Federal Government mandates on fuel economy requirements. As a result of higher energy costs, automobile designers in specifying materials are now considering not only the cost of substitute materials but also material weight, since lighter car weight promotes fuel economy. Over the lifetime of a car, comparative life cycle energy use relationships were derived in this study for the three major materials used in making flat (sheet) products used in automobile manufacture: 1) steel, both carbon and high strength-low alloy, 2) aluminum, and 3) selected plastics. This study focused on substitution of one material for another on a given sized automobile. Results are presented graphically showing weight trade-offs of one material against another in order to achieve equal life cycle energy use.

This paper presents some results of the cooperation between Opel and Norsk Hydro for optimizing the life cycle of an automotive structural part using a holistic life cycle assessment approach. The aim of the study presented in this paper was to compare, already in the vehicle development stage, the environmentally relevant parameters of two alternative material applications for a vehicle component with functional equivalence, using the Life Cycle Engineering approach developed by PE Product Engineering GmbH. The comparison of the two alternative part designs made out of steel and magnesium alloy considered the production of materials, the processing of the materials to manufacture the cross beam component, and the use phase as a part applied to the complete vehicle. End-of-life options were also taken into consideration.

The Institute for Polymer Testing and Polymer Science of the University of Stuttgart has been investigating automotive parts, structures and cars during their life cycle in plenty cooperation with the European automobile producers and their suppliers for the last 9 years. Therefore a holistic approach has been developed to combine tasks from technique, economic and environment in a methodology called Life Cycle Engineering (LCE). The goal is to find a way to support designer and engineers as well as police makers and public with this three-dimensional interrelated information to have the possibility to manufacture future products in a more sustainable way without loosing contact two the traditional parameters technique and costs.

Mercedes-Benz at DaimlerChrysler has been developing and applying Life-Cycle-Engineering (LCE) and Life-Cycle-Assessment (LCA) since almost 10 years. Extensive experience and know-how has been gained by several complete car LCAs and more than 100 LCAs for parts. According to our experience LCA/LCE is most effectively and efficiently used to support the development of new products, i.e. as a tool for Design for the Environment. The concept and implementation of Design for Environment (DfE) at Mercedes-Benz will be introduced. Both, concept and implementation are the result of several years of development. Nowadays, DfE is established as common practice and fully integrated in the Mercedes-Benz Development Process. This approach is illustrated by the exemplary case study of the recent C-Class model. The parameters assessed during the development process include hazardous materials, use of recycled materials, use of renewable materials and others.

Cars cause a lot of pollutants during the utilization phase. Within the last years environmental legislation tried to reduce the emissions by the introduction of very tight laws. The results are impressive: Most of the car exhaust emissions like carbonmonoxid and nitrous oxides have been reduced. At this stage new emission reduction limits in Europe as well as in the United States can only be achieved if the formulation of the catalyst system is significantly changed. An increased use of precious metals and rare earth materials is the result of such a modification which succeeds in a more expensive design of the total catalyst systems. More expensive means not only cost aspects but also the environmental burdens related to the increased production of precious metals and other catalyst components. The Life Cycle Engineering (LCE) of the catalyst system which achieves the new legislation is demonstrated as well as the effects to the usage phase.

This paper considers the issues and provides some lessons learned with respect to implementing a life cycle environmental assessment (LCEA) and environmental cost analysis (LCEC) program within a major DoD system acquisition. The latest revision of Directive 5000.2, Mandatory Procedures for Major Defense Acquisition Programs, requires, among other things, that life cycle environmental aspects be considered early in the design process[1]. Further, the 1995 Defense Appropriations Act, Section 815, requires that environmental costs be an integral part of the system life cycle cost analysis. For this effort project personnel, with the guidance of the Office of the Program Manager staff, developed an LCEA/LCEC Program, trained design teams on the elements of the program and prepared a data collection template to assist in the ongoing data collection effort.

Life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) has been suggested as an effective means of providing strategic environmental information to enable more informed decision making. The process of how to conduct an LCIA has been the center of controversy as evidenced during the development of the draft international standard life cycle assessment principles and framework document (ISO 14040). For the past decade, successful methods have been employed in the field of human health and ecological risk assessment to predict chemical-related environmental impacts. This paper investigates areas of commonality between LCIA and risk assessment, and presents a conceptual framework suggesting how better integration of risk assessment might be achieved in the automotive industry's goal of reducing car fluff quantity and toxicity.

Life cycle impacts and sustainability considerations are unique to a specific vehicle design. This paper compares initial life cycle impacts and sustainability considerations of an electric, hybrid and two conventional vehicles. The analysis provides comparable information for vehicle usage, design, product limitation, battery implications, life-span factors, environmental impacts, maintenance, user requirements, recyclability, recoverability, energy consumptions and the sustainability for these vehicles. The evaluation provides value for automotive designers, component suppliers and end users. A variety of design intentions to reduce vehicle weight, improve efficiency and increase technological innovation; can be challenged by end user requirements, in this quantitative approach.

The Institute for Polymer Testing and Polymer Science (IKP) is an independent institute of the University of Stuttgart. For approximately 8 years work is done on the field of Life Cycle Engineering. The first couple of years knowledge about the production of materials was collected within plenty industrial cooperation. Parallel to this a methodology for the Life Cycle Engineering approach and a software system (GaBi 1.0-2.0) were developed. Based on these information, projects for balancing single parts like bumpers, fender, air intake manifolds and oil filters followed by projects handling more complex parts or processes like several body in white, headlights, fuel tanks, green tire or coating processes were done to establish the methodology of Life Cycle Engineering as a tool for decision makers and weak point analysis. Parallel to this a methodology for an Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) for the system automobile was developed in cooperation with the Volkswagen AG in 1993.

We compare the life cycle inventories of near–term fuel–propulsion technologies. We analyze fossil fuels (conventional and reformulated gasolines, low sulfur diesel, and compressed natural gas (CNG)), ethanol from biomass, and electricity, together with internal combustion engines (port and direct injection, spark and compression ignited) and electric vehicles (battery–powered, hybrid electric, and fuel cell). The fuel economy and emissions of conventional internal combustion engines powered by gasoline continue to improve. Unless emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases (GHG) are stringently regulated or gasoline prices more than double, gasoline powered internal combustion engines will continue to dominate the light duty fleet. Two appealing alternative fuels are CNG and biomass ethanol. CNG cars have low emissions, including GHG and the fuel is less expensive than gasoline. Biomass ethanol can be renewable and have no net carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

The Inventory Analysis for the life cycle of sugarcane ethanol is presented. Methodological problems related to the application of the Life Cycle Assessment methodology to agricultural systems are discussed and solutions are proposed, based on the literature. The system modeled is representative of the State of São Paulo/Brazil and includes an agricultural sub-system and an industrial sub-system. The agricultural sub-system includes all operations required for the production and the delivery of cane to the industrial sub-system. The industrial sub-system includes all processes for the production of sugar, alcohol (anhydrous and hydrous) and surplus power. The agricultural sub-system and its management practices covering the whole life cycle of sugarcane biomass is discussed in detail, since most of the environmental aspects occur in this sub-system.

In this paper we present a hybrid approach to Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) using the case study of an electronically controlled unit injector (EUI), which is a time-controlled fuel injection system. Using the hybrid approach, we are able to quantify environmental information on upstream production processes preceding manufacture at Bosch without the need to gather all supplier data empirically. Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) data based on “conventional” process models are combined with LCI data from economic input-output relations between different industry sectors and associated pollution discharges and nonrenewable resource consumption. The economic input-output-based LCA (EIO-LCA) allows us to quantify indirect environmental impacts of production processes generally neglected in conventional LCA models. As EIO-LCA quantifies environmental impacts on a rather aggregate level, additional process models for LCA are used to account for specific characteristics of the processes investigated.

As a means of effectively incorporating the concept of “life cycle” for reducing the environmental impact of the automobile, we carried out a life cycle inventory study on a part-by-part basis. The targets of our study are the fuel tanks that are made of different materials and manufacturing processes. One is made of steel, and the other is made of plastic, both perform identical functions. Our evaluation study encompasses the period from the manufacturing of the main materials until the disposal of the tanks. The evaluation items consist of the amount of energy consumed and the emissions (of CO2, NOx, SOx, and PM) that are released into the atmosphere. The results show that the plastic tank poses a greater burden in terms of the amount of energy consumed and the CO2 and NOx emitted.

A life cycle inventory (LCI) study evaluates the environmental performance of the ULSAB-AVC (UltraLight Steel Auto Body - Advanced Vehicle Concepts) vehicle product system. The LCI quantifies the inputs and outputs of each life cycle stage of the ULSAB-AVC PNGV-gas engine vehicle (998 kg) over the 193,000 km service lifetime of the vehicle. The use phase of the ULSAB-AVC PNGV-diesel engine variant (1031 kg) is also quantified. The data categories measured for each life cycle phase include resource and energy consumption, air and water pollutant emissions, and solid waste production. The ULSAB-AVC LCI study is based on the methods, model and data from the 1999 study by the United States Automotive Materials Partnership (USAMP), a consortium within the United States Council for Automotive Research. This model was modified to represent the ULSAB-AVC PNGV-gas engine vehicle for each life cycle phase as well as the use phase of the PNGV-diesel engine variant.