Supporting information to the characterisation factors of recommended EF Life Cycle Impact Assessment methods: New methods and differences with ILCD

In 2013, the Environmental Footprint methodology has been established with a specific Recommendation (2013/179/EU), within the framework of the “Single Market for Green Products” communication (COM/2013/0196). The International Life Cycle Data system, developed since 2007, released in 2010 and continuously maintained by JRC, has been adopted in the EF framework. ILCD format and nomenclature were adopted as requirements for EF. Given the different needs and goals of the EF, some methods for the Life Cycle Impact Assessment have been changed compared to ILCD (and therefore the elementary flows have been adapted accordingly, and to some extent, the format has been expanded). The the LCIA methods are developed within the database as ILCD-formatted xml files to allow electronic import into LCA software; The LCIA methods are implemented as separate data sets which contain all the descriptive metadata documentation and the characterisation factors assigned to different elementary flows (that are also xml files within the DB). This document provide a view on the changes occurred within the methods for the mid-point impact assessment (the EF is considering for now only impacts at the level of potential changes, not at the potential damage level, which was captured in ILCD scheme for the methods at the end-point level). The changes and adaptations occurred within the ILCD scheme, that led to the creation of the current EF set of methods and a new package, based on ILCD format, containing new files for LCIA methods, can be summarized as follows: • 6 methods are completely new, or updated according to the newest releases of the old methods adopted in ILCD. • The elementary flow list has been fixed and expanded according to the needs of the new methods • Within the new methods several flows have been spatially differentiated (in ILCD format the location attribute is resolved at the method level, not at the elementary flow level) • For several flows that were not characterized (both in newly added methods and in the pre-existing ones that were not modified), a CF has been adopted, where a direct proxy for a specific substance/compartment was available. • Specific exceptions, integrations or corrections have been implemented in different methods. All these aspects are detailed within the document. Furthermore, additional files have been released, containing an exhaustive view of all the changes occurred in the transition phase between the ILCD and the EF scheme (see annex2). Additional updates will be released through the website of the European Platform on LCA (http://eplca.jrc.ec.europa.eu/). Other methods (e.g. those related to toxicity aspects) are under development, during the editing of this document; therefore an updated version will be released as soon as the new recommended methods are defined.JRC.D.1-Bio-econom