Life Cycle Assessment of Forest and Wood Products in Australia

The first national rigorous Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) of representative Australian forest and wood products andprocesses was developed to provide quantitative information on sustainability imperatives which are starting to drivebusiness decisions and government policies, particularly those relating to wood products. In devising solutions, it isrequired to assess how much energy, water or chemical has gone into manufacturing a product, and what greenhousegas emissions or other emissions to the environment have been released in the process. The Life Cycle Inventory wascreated to allow the environmental impacts of the production of common engineered timber products and systems to bequantified and evaluated from cradle-to-gate. The Life Cycle Inventory database covers five categories: softwoodplantation and hardwood native forests; softwood framing and hardwood timbers; veneer, plywood and LVL;particleboard and MDF; and glulam and engineered I-beams.