The rising global demand for metals used in renewable energy generation technologies poses supply risks and socio-environmental impacts, threatening a sustainable energy transition. While the role of circular economy in reducing their demand has gained attention, its potentials related to advances in technology design remains underexplored. Here, we use explorative scenarios to assess circular technology design potentials for...

Purpose Life cycle assessment (LCA) has been widely used to assess the environmental benefits of lifetime extension, a circular economy strategy for reducing product impact. However, although such LCA results are sensitive to product lifetime, the selection between existing lifetime modelling approaches has not been discussed so far. Therefore, this study aims to provide recommendations on the selection of suitable lifetime mo...

Purpose Product lifetime is central to circular strategies that by lifetime extension could increase products’ environmental performance. In life cycle assessment (LCA), little attention has been paid to product lifetime modelling, although the environmental benefit of lifetime extension can vary greatly with lifetime values. Since product lifetime modelling may have a significant effect on the results, this study identifies a...

Purpose How to assess impacts of mineral resources is much discussed in life cycle assessment (LCA). We see a need for, and a lack of, a mineral resource impact assessment method that captures the perspective of long-term global scarcity of elements. Method A midpoint-level mineral resource impact assessment method matching this perspective is proposed, called the crustal scarcity indicator (CSI), with characterization factors...