Visualizing complex production systems with ease

HAMBURG, Germany - Oct. 9, 2013 - PRLog -- At the LCA XIII conference in Orlando, Florida, Marten Stock from the Hamburg Institute of Environmental IT presented various ways to visualize the environmental impacts of products, in order to make their improved environmental performance more visible and easier to understand.

Hamburg – "Fulfilling LCA's Promise" was the main focus of the 13th LCA conference, taking place in Orlando this year. Experts from all over the world gathered in Florida to take a close look at where LCA stands today and how this useful tool could be further developed. The conference offered a wide spectrum of courses, training sessions and workshops to demonstrate the growing usefulness and range of applications of LCAs. Participants were especially interested in case studies presented by top-notch speakers.

One of those was Marten Stock, expert and trainer at the Hamburg Institute of Environmental IT (ifu Hamburg GmbH). In his presentation he demonstrated how Sankey diagrams can help provide a better systems understanding in regards to the causes of environmental impacts in complex systems.

In another presentation, focusing on the initial experiences using of the new ecoinvent 3 data base, Martina Prox from ifu Hamburg demonstrated how the various visualizing options of Sankey diagrams can already support users in the build-up phase of their modeling. The use of quantity-based projections [illustrations, imaging?] also allows to depict important subsystems for environmental impact factors. At one glance, these diagrams can now relay an array of information that otherwise had to be gleaned from painstaking data analysis. The audience was especially interested in the fact that this lets users focus their time and resources on detailed models and analysis of the areas with the greatest impact on the environmental footprint – thus making the creation of LCAs faster and more efficient.

LCA XIII is the largest cross-sector [industry wide?] conference of the United States and is organized by ACLCA (American Center for Life Cycle Assessment). The ACLCA is a non-profit organization which aims to deepen the knowledge about the advantages and use of life cycle assessments in governments, industry and NGOs.