Organisation Environmental Footprint process of the European Commission will
affect the international market and business to apply the life cycle approach in
decision making and communication [2]. So how does industry embed life cycle
approaches into their business? What is best practice? How are ISO 14001:2015
and the Product/Organisation Environmental footprint process (respectively PEF
and OEF) being used and can they support the work of improving the environmental performance of products, services and organizations?
The session invited industries to present different ways to implement the life
cycle perspective into their environmental management systems, learnings and best
practices. The session also invited presenters to take up from results and learnings
from the European PEF/OEF process. What is the next step for businesses,
policy-makers and the life cycle management community in order to create a more
sustainable industry and communicate results to customers, citizens and other
stakeholders? What actions have been seen and will be seen? What are the
opportunities and challenges? The session attracted many abstracts with different
perspectives and the presenters were selected to reflect those perspectives with the
hopes of a fruitful panel discussion at the end of the session.
2 Main Messages from the Presentations
Three oral presentations were selected to describe different ways of how life cycle
approaches and life cycle management were incorporated into business strategies.
At Procter & Gamble, the OEF has been used to understand the corporate hot spots
and identify sustainability actions based on these, quantify progress over time and
effectively report to external programs such as CDP [3].
Aptar Italia’s roadmap towards sustainability was presented to give an insight in
the company’s use of LCA as a basis for their business. The organization’s most
important strategic principle is the customers’ awareness of the value of sustainability [4].
AkzoNobel has used monetization of externalities (expressing consequences of
an economic activity experienced by unrelated third party in monetary/financial
terms) as an approach to integrate life cycle management in decision making. The
methods behind the “3D profit and loss account” were described and also the
methods behind the economic, environmental and social capital for both positive
and negative externalities, e.g. the Environmental Priority Strategies (EPS) [5].
The last two presentations were selected to give insights and perspectives on the
environmental footprint process from the European Commission. The OEF process
was discussed by one of the OEF pilots in the retail sector and from a communication effectiveness perspective. The pilot study shows both a potential and a value
of OEF as it helps retailers to assess and improve their product portfolio and to
make sure their sustainability strategy targets major issues first [6].
The communication effectiveness was studied through how human brains
interpret environmental information on products and how to use this information in
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L. Landström and S. Palander
affect the international market and business to apply the life cycle approach in
decision making and communication [2]. So how does industry embed life cycle
approaches into their business? What is best practice? How are ISO 14001:2015
and the Product/Organisation Environmental footprint process (respectively PEF
and OEF) being used and can they support the work of improving the environmental performance of products, services and organizations?
The session invited industries to present different ways to implement the life
cycle perspective into their environmental management systems, learnings and best
practices. The session also invited presenters to take up from results and learnings
from the European PEF/OEF process. What is the next step for businesses,
policy-makers and the life cycle management community in order to create a more
sustainable industry and communicate results to customers, citizens and other
stakeholders? What actions have been seen and will be seen? What are the
opportunities and challenges? The session attracted many abstracts with different
perspectives and the presenters were selected to reflect those perspectives with the
hopes of a fruitful panel discussion at the end of the session.
2 Main Messages from the Presentations
Three oral presentations were selected to describe different ways of how life cycle
approaches and life cycle management were incorporated into business strategies.
At Procter & Gamble, the OEF has been used to understand the corporate hot spots
and identify sustainability actions based on these, quantify progress over time and
effectively report to external programs such as CDP [3].
Aptar Italia’s roadmap towards sustainability was presented to give an insight in
the company’s use of LCA as a basis for their business. The organization’s most
important strategic principle is the customers’ awareness of the value of sustainability [4].
AkzoNobel has used monetization of externalities (expressing consequences of
an economic activity experienced by unrelated third party in monetary/financial
terms) as an approach to integrate life cycle management in decision making. The
methods behind the “3D profit and loss account” were described and also the
methods behind the economic, environmental and social capital for both positive
and negative externalities, e.g. the Environmental Priority Strategies (EPS) [5].
The last two presentations were selected to give insights and perspectives on the
environmental footprint process from the European Commission. The OEF process
was discussed by one of the OEF pilots in the retail sector and from a communication effectiveness perspective. The pilot study shows both a potential and a value
of OEF as it helps retailers to assess and improve their product portfolio and to
make sure their sustainability strategy targets major issues first [6].
The communication effectiveness was studied through how human brains
interpret environmental information on products and how to use this information in
158
L. Landström and S. Palander