What is the meaning of "Direct impact contributions" in exported results?

Question

I have calculated the LCIA results for a process using Ecoinvent APOS System Processes database and openLCA version 2.1.

After exporting the results as an Excel file, there are five sheets in the file: "Calculation setup", "Inventory", "Impacts", "Direct inventory contributions", and "Direct impact contributions". I'm a little bit confused about the word "Direct" in this context. In earlier versions, I think a similar sheet as the "Direct impact contributions" was named "Process upstream impacts". Is there now something different between these results?

So, do I understand correctly that the total (Scope 3) impact results are shown on the sheet "Impacts", but on the last sheet (Direct impact contributions), the complete upstream contributions (Scope 3) are listed for each upstream and downstream process in separate columns? And in the column that has the name of my process, are the results showing the Scope 1 contributions of my process?

Answer 1

Hi hlappal,

thanks for reaching out. The amount of sheets you get is after Excel export up to you. You can also add upstream inventories/impacts sheets, please have a look at our manual: https://greendelta.github.io/openLCA2-manual/res_analysis/save_export.html (at the bottom of that page). For more clarification on what 'direct' means in openLCA please refer to this https://greendelta.github.io/openLCA2-manual/cheat/direct.html.
Hope this helps,

Jonas