Life Cycle Assessment

LCAs come in different shapes and sizes, depending on the stage of development and your goals. We typically categorise the LCAs into four banks, where the certainty of design and the level of assumptions go hand-in-hand:

1. Indicative LCA – Typically at the Front End Innovation stage of development, this involves a benchmarking exercise to establish a development pathway, and a top-level assessment of novel technology.
2. Conceptual LCA – Taking place during the concept generation and proof of principle stage of development, this involves an assessment of competing concepts, working with reasonable assumptions.
3. Detailed LCA – Covering proof of principle through detailed design, pilot manufacture & DVT and industrialisation, this LCA is built on refined inputs to develop a detailed environmental assessment. It can assist with identifying both early design decisions that can improve sustainability, as well as supply chain selection, material selection and packaging.
4. Review LCA – Often carried out post-market, a review LCA uses real-world data to offer up-to-date LCA results. It can be used to identify potential carbon footprint hotspots that need to be addressed, evaluate strategies to reduce impact without changing existing production, and compare to on-market products to understand opportunities for improvement.

Your specific requirements may sit somewhere on this spectrum, and we would tailor the approach to best suit the level of detail and insight required.

At Team, we follow standard frameworks such as ISO 14040/14044 for LCA and ISO 14067 for PCF. The process for conducting an LCA involves three key stages: inputs, calculations and outputs.

1. LCA inputs – LCAs rely on a mixture of inputs, from data measured directly from production data where possible, to measurements of similar on-market products, and failing this reasonable assumptions based on experience. At Team, we draw on 40 years of expertise in medical device development to build considered assumptions and life cycle stages, from anticipated attributes of production to distribution, product use and disposal.
2. LCA calculations – At Team, we use industry-standard software such as SimaPro as well as an in-house bespoke tool to manage both LCA inputs and outputs. Drawing on both SimaPro’s catalogue of datasets, we also use our own library of data specific to the production and disposal of medical device components.
3. LCA outputs – The third stage of an LCA involve identifying potential hotspots, applying through-life assessment and the identification of trade-off points. When the outputs are ready for assessment, we treat each case individually, focusing on what is important and what can be actioned.

Every company has its own environmental objectives. When conducting an LCA, these objectives are carefully factored in by selecting the most appropriate functional units, ensuring the analysis reflects what matters most to you. We then use the outputs from the LCA, alongside other environmental metrics, to define KPIs that align with your goals. These KPIs may focus on areas such as carbon emissions, plastics use or circularity.