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Life Cycle Thinking in policy
 In
China it is called circular economy, in Europe Integrated
Product Policy (IPP), and there are many other names. The direction
is clear: Life cycle thinking is the basis for future policy making.
IPP will transform regulation
from traditional environmental legislation to product chain management.
This will impact your business in many ways if you are active in the
European market. Already now, several new important directives are life
cycle based.
What IPP means for
your business
IPP will transform regulation from traditional environmental legislation
to product chain management. This will impact your business in many
ways, if you are active in the European market. Already now, several
new important directives are lifecycle based:
- The Energy using Products directive, will require you to produce
an ecodesign dossier for all mass produced energy using products
- The REACH directive emphasizes the importance of adopting a life
cycle perspective on managing chemicals. It becomes important to
trace at which point substances enter the product. This means you
will need to manage the supply chain, or you will be confronted
with substances that should not be in your product.
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New thematic strategy
on resources and waste
Early 2006 the EU launched two new thematic strategies. Such strategies
are the starting point for new legislation.
- The new thematic strategy on waste shows that waste legislation
will be based on lifecycle thinking. Instead of having fixed rules,
stakeholders must demonstrate that their solution is the best solution.
- The new strategy on resources will transform product legislation.
The legislation will be lifecycle based. Please note that, when
the EU mention resources, they mean all impacts, as they see clean
air and water as a resource.
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Prioritisation of
product groups
In Japan, Australia and Europe studies have been made identifying
which products are causing the highest environmental load. These products
will be prioritized in future policy development. Such prioritisation
studies use environmental input-output databases.
The result of these studies is a list of commodities that are ranked
according to the environmental load per economic value. The idea is
that products that have a high load, but that contribute little to the
economic growth should be targeted with policies first. Typically the
food sector comes out unfavourably.
The database used in the European study (EIPRO), is closely related
to the USA input output table.
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