Not sure if ELCD database is correct

Question

Hi there,

I am conducting my first ever LCA for a university project so I am completely new to this software.
I have been putting in some arbitrary values to see how it affects the impact assessment inputs and outputs.
The photo shows how apparently there is a lot of radioactive inputs for transporting through Europe in a small lorry. This can`t be correct?

Any help would be much appreciated!

Answer 1

Hi ravim,
indeed this looks strange but this is from the ELCD database directly. The amounts itself are rather small (1e-6) though. From what we understand, the flows are not meant to be connected to other processes and for building supply chains. For earlier (pre 1.7) versions of openLCA, we added the dummy processes to link to these to these flows; in 1.7 there is the possibility to decide if you want to link to providers or not.
Hth,
Andreas

Comments

Thank you for your response!

I am now having another issue. Surprisingly, within the ELCD database, there is no option for landfilling of plastic without any energy recovery (i.e. the plastic goes to landfill and is left there without any treatment). Is there a way to use two databases for one product system?

Best wishes,
Ravi

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Hi Ravim,
you can import any other database in openLCA (zolca file) into another database, just select file / import / other / import entire database; this combines then the contents of the two databases, the one that is active and the one that you are importing, and allows you (among other things) to use the contents of both for one product system.
Hth,
Andreas

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Hi Ravim,
Andreas is correct and this is a great feature of openLCA. But if you follow that path, take time to make sure that the LCIA methods you apply capture flow names and classificaitons from all the databses you use to build the LCI.
Good luck
Chris