An integrated approach for risk-based life cycle assessment and multi-criteria decision-making: Selection, design and evaluation of cleaner and greener processes

Cleaner and greener technologies for process and product selection and design have gained popularity in recent years. Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a systematic approach that enables selection of cleaner and greener products and processes. Recently, significant progress has been made for the use of LCA for product/process evaluation and selection, however, its use in process design and environmental decision-making has not been fully exploited. There are challenging activities which require trade-offs among conflicting attributes like cost, technical feasibility and environmental impacts. These attributes can be analysed at the early design stage by considering the full life cycle of a process (and/or a product). A cleaner and greener process referred economical, technically feasible and environmental friendly alternative. This paper proposes an integrated methodology for design by combining LCA with multi-criteria decisionmaking. This methodology is simple and applicable at the early design stage and guide decisionmaking under uncertainty. Application of the methodology is demonstrated through a case study of urea production.