End-of-Life Scenarios for Construction Products

One Click LCA's Building Life Cycle Assessment modules support three end-of-life settings: 

• Market scenarios, user adjustable with Expert features
• EPD EOL scenario, user adjustable with Expert features
• Material-locked scenario

The market scenario is the recommended default unless your chosen calculation tool has specified end-of-life settings that mandate the 'material-locked' scenario.

1. Market-based end-of-life scenario

The market-based end-of-life scenarios provide the following end-of-life stage emissions:

• C2 (Transport to waste processing)
• C3 (Waste processing for reuse, recycling, and/or recycling)
• C4 (Waste Disposal)
• D (Reuse, recovery, and/or recycling potentials, expressed as net impacts and benefits)

The chosen end-of-life profiles and their emission values can also be found in the data card if the market-based end-of-life method has been chosen. The scenarios have been modelled with Ecoinvent data. 

The processes are tied to the material subtypes, and for this reason, there are no C1 emissions. C1 emissions can be added manually by adding a scenario for deconstruction in the construction site operations query.

Examples

Materials may not always have C2, C3, and C4 data. Two examples of when materials have a partial set of C-phase emissions:

• Glass wool by default is transported and then landfilled, this means it will have C2 and C4 data.
• Concrete by default is transported and then downcycled into aggregate, which means it will have C2 and C3 data, see the example below.

Using the feature 'See Detailed Calculation Mechanics' you will be able to open the data cards for each of the transport and end-of-life processes as well.

2. EPD End-of-Life scenario

The EPD end-of-life scenario takes the values directly from the EPD when available and usable. If you would like to know which process is used, you will have to check the EPD itself. 

3. Material-locked End-of-Life scenario

The Material-Locked end-of-life scenario calculates C3, C4, and D and follows EN 15 978 / EN 15804. The categorization and end-of-life scenarios come from Ökobaudat. This includes the End-of-life scenario for:

• C3 (Waste processing for reuse, recycling, and/or recycling)
• C4 (Waste Disposal)
• D (Reuse, recovery, and/or recycling potentials, expressed as net impacts and benefits)

This does not apply to DGNB calculation tools, in which C1, C2, C3, C4, and D information is mandated by the scheme and from which the EPD is also taken into consideration.  

Material Group	Material Group	Materials included	C3 – C4, waste processing and landfilling	D, recycling benefits
Mineral building materials	Recycling for groundworks	Concrete*, Cement*, Bricks, Porcelain, Plaster, Clay products, Stone, Ceramics, Asphalt	C3: Construction waste preparation for recycling	Recycling benefit from replacing the primary gravel
Metals	Metal preparation and recycling**	Aluminium, Steel, Stainless steel, Galvanized steel, Copper coated, Copper uncoated, Brass, Zinc, Lead	C3: Metal waste preparation	Recycling benefits for replacing virgin metal
Biobased materials with a heating value	Incineration and energy recovery	Wood, Wood products	C3: Construction waste incineration for energy recovery	Recovered energy (replacing average energy production)
Other materials with a heating value	Incineration and energy recovery	Plastics	C3: Construction waste incineration for energy recovery	Recovered energy (replacing average energy production)
Other materials that can be landfilled in construction waste site	Disposal/landfilling of inert material	Coatings, Synthetic materials, Panels and boards***, Insulating materials***, Glass, Window and façade components***	Disposal of inert construction waste	-

* Taking into account concrete carbonization

** Recycling potential can only be reported for metals with shares of primary manufacturing, i.e. if a product is made of recycled material, it no longer has recycling potential. 5% of losses are assumed for recycling (the remaining 95% are recycled).

*** When not included in the above groups