Technology has improved many aspects of life (or at least made them easier), and often advances in technology are touted as being able to vastly improve the human condition. All too often, however, these advances that help humans may harm the environment. Using life cycle assessment (LCA) early in the technology development process can help identify possible ways of damaging the environment.
There is no set standard for how to apply the procedures to assess these new technologies and they tend to be applied in an ad-hoc fashion, rather than an organized, standardized one.
In a special issue of Yale’s Journal of Industrial Ecology, “Life Cycle Assessment for Emerging Technologies,” details findings that can impact both technology developers and policymakers. The researchers try to address the issue of being able to test new technologies with respect to transportation, infrastructure, energy, and materials.
The issue includes two papers that reveal the harmful effects to the environment created by the increase in the production of lithium-ion batteries, which power an array of devices, both small and large. The research found that even with expanded lithium production, we likely have at least 30 more years before we run out of lithium. Conversely, the environmental impacts of producing these batteries are felt globally.
According to Reid Lifset, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Industrial Ecology, “The research in this issue advances not only the understanding and methods for the environmental assessment of novel technologies, it also shows the potential for refashioning the tools of systematic environmental assessment to apply at the earliest stages of the innovation cycle.