The energy supply chain is the backbone of industrialised societies, but it is also one of the leading causes of global environmental burden. Life cycle management (LCM) and life cycle assessment (LCA) are increasingly being used in combination with energy system optimisation models (ESOM) to better represent the energy sector and its dynamics, and facilitate better decision-making. The integration of ESOM and LCA can enable powerful analyses, but not without difficulties. In this chapter, we review studies linking a well-known bottom-up ESOM (TIMES) with LCA databases and identify the principal challenges and how they have been addressed. One of the main integration challenges is the identification of equivalent processes between life cycle inventories and ESOM databases: the mapping problem. Other concomitant issues such as double counting and parameter consistency have been identified and are also investigated.
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Astudillo, M., Vaillancourt, K., Pineau, P.-O., Amor, B. (2018). « Integrating Energy System Models in Life Cycle Management », In: Benetto, E., Gericke, K., Guiton, M. (eds) Designing Sustainable Technologies, Products and Policies. Springer, Cham.
