Have your fish and eat it too

The ’winner’ takes it all

A couple of weeks ago we played a game in class, based on the well-known ‘tragedy of the commons’. In short, the game was played like this; there is a sea with 50 fish in it. Left alone the fish will double each year, but there are several teams which can catch fish. The teams can decide for themselves how many fish to catch each year, but as soon as the total number of fish caught equals the total number of fish available the catch stops and the game is – literally – over. You do not need rocket science to see that if half the fish are caught they will be replenished in the next year and fishing will be sustainable. In this game it is easy; if you need sustainable fishery at a higher volume, all you need to do is catch less than half the available fish. If only real life were that simple…

Now, as the maths were very simple, did it lead to sustainable fishery? No, it did not. Apart from the clash between personal interest and public good which is the basis of the tragedy of the commons, this was also caused by the rules of the game, which defined the aim of the game as ‘to have the largest profit at the end of the game by catching as many fish as possible’ (quoted from the lecture slide). This means there is no dilemma, the aim is to catch as many fish as possible, or at least more than the other teams. If this game is played next year I suggest a new name for it; Lemmings. It is the surest and fastest way to extinction. The ‘winning team’ is not winning; the team is out of fish just a little bit later than the other teams. They all lose.

Playing the game like this shows that we are all part of the problem, but the result is predictable and nothing changes. Now we are Industrial Ecology students, supposed to become actors of change (see

http://ie.leidendelft.nl/newsarchive/ ). It is important to see how we are part of the problem, but our aim should be to become part of the solution. The game as described above does not reflect this.

Now it is much easier to suggest that the game needs a change than to actually define how it should be played. I suggest the following, which I believe reflects reality as well as the original game; give each team a secret goal for the game, in the same way it is done in RISK. In this game each team is given the goal to have the fish numbers sustained at 50, but they do not know the goals the others have. If the teams manage to achieve this (say, for five consecutive rounds) they all win. If not, they all lose.

Will this work? To be honest I have no idea, but I would like to know. Even if this alternative manner of playing ends with an empty sea it can be a starting point for a discussion why it did not work. If it ends with all teams winning it can be a starting point for a discussion how to make it work in the real world. 

Car game 2.0

The aim of the game

My latest post in this blog was called The Car Game. It describes my efforts to design an industrial ecology simulation which is both fun and lets you experience what it is like to make decisions which affect your sustainability performance in combination with other effects, e.g. on sales and competitiveness, in a world that is dynamic and not always predictable.

This post was part of a bigger project initiated by our social systems teacher Frank Boons. He planned to read our posts and combine our ideas with his own to design a game to be played in class.

Last Thursday we played the game. For the details kindly refer to Frank’s own blog http://ieteacher.blogspot.nl/, where he will post them. Name of the game; Car game 2.0.

The aim of Car game 2.0 was (quoting from the handout); to have participants experience the mechanisms of variation (transmission?) and selection, and how these lead to system results in terms of market shifts. Comparing Frank’s game with mine you will immediately notice a couple of differences. I name the most obvious ones.

• ·        Whereas fun was my first objective, it is missing in the aim formulated by Frank. (He did ask if we had enjoyed it, however).
• ·        Whereas my (formulation of the) aim is for the players to experience what it is like to be in a producer’s position and make the decisions, Frank’s formulation is that of an observer, his aim is to have the participants see the big picture in terms of social systems.
• ·        In the game designed by Frank, the players can be producers or consumers. Frank himself is both the bank and the government. In fact he is the deus ex machina, trying to direct the variation and selection process. (whereas in my game the players are all producers and the other parties are represented by cards)
• ·        Car game 2.0 has a (very thin) relation with the concepts of industrial ecology in that consumers can choose for more or less sustainable cars or even public transportation instead of buying a car. (whereas in my game the focus is on sustainability and competitiveness) It is a socio-economist’s game rather than an industrial ecologist’s.

In this blog I shall try and describe the game as it was played last Thursday, with my observations and suggestions.

In this game I was a consumer, and a conscientious one at that. My first choice was public transport. Apart from being the obvious sustainable choice it enabled me to save a little money and purchase a better car in the second period. I expected the others to go for cars immediately but, much to my surprise, 6 out of the 16 consumers opted for public transport. Of course this meant that some of the producers were left with unsold cars, which were binned immediately.

The company which offered the more durable cars, combined with strong marketing, did best in the first two rounds, but then the effects of this durability became visible; sales dropped. Consumers with the more durable cars did not buy new cars, in spite of the producers’ efforts to tempt them with all kinds of special price arrangements etc. In addition to that the government stepped in with a tax on CO₂ emission, which in fact increased the price of cars, which reduced sales even more. This meant lots of business for the recycling company – recycling unsold new cars.

It goes without saying that the car companies reacted with a reduction of production capacity. As a result in the next round there was a shortage of cars. Customers who would have liked to buy a car had to go for the public transport option.

Being a sustainable consumer in this game was not very exciting. After going for public transport in the first round and buying a durable car in the second round I could skip rounds three and four which in fact meant waiting until the others had made their choices, so I had the opportunity to observe. The winning producers had fun, they used their creativity in creating special options to the cars and special sales arrangements. In fact the consumers had little choice, they had select from the options available. Those consumers who did enjoy the game – in my observation, that is – were those who went to negotiate with the producers even if they had no money to buy a car, and tried to influence the production plans, e.g. by ordering cars for the next round with all of the producers, so production would go up and prices would go down, or who traded in their cars and found other ways to stretch the rules of the game.

I would have thought that being a producer were more interesting, but after a few rounds the first company stopped production. There was a management buy-out and the CEOs became consumers, not because they were bankrupt but because they did not want to be producers anymore.

The last round was announced as time was almost up. In this last round I could buy a car again, which I did, but here the ‘last round effect’ was stronger than any market effects. Cars were sold just for any price as the game was over anyway. The game sort of collapsed.

Did it work?

The aim of this game was to have participants experience the mechanisms of variation (transmission?) and selection, and how these lead to system results in terms of market shift. Now we experienced some mechanisms of variation and selection in that some producers did better than others, and of course one of the producers dropped out but we played just a few rounds. The effect of government could not be experienced in just one measure which did not really work either. So, on the whole I do not think the aim of the game was reached – as far as I am concerned.

There was some market shift towards durable cars, but this was inherent in the rules of the game. The choice for a durable car was favourable for the consumers as it was simply the cheapest choice. Safety and luxury cost money for the consumers, but there was no advantage in terms of the game. As for the consumers there was no winning the game they went for the only measurable effect, that is money.

I believe we did not play enough rounds to really experience the effects of variation and selection and not by far enough to feel the effect of government intervention. On the other hand, to be honest, when it was time to stop I was already losing interest.

Suggestions for improvement

If this game is to give an insight into the variation and selection mechanisms and the resulting market shifts it must make it possible for these things to happen, preferably with one or two hours.

How to make it work?

I suggest the following;

1.   Speed up. Make sure everything is ready when the students arrive. Make a good instruction which everyone can read. Answer questions and start the game. Preparations should not take more than 10-15 minutes.

2.   Prepare. Make a plan of what each round is to bring, what the financial results of the various choices must be. If you have to calculate these while the game is being played it slows everything down.

3.   Find a different room. In a lecture room there is no place for a free market.

4.   Make the game interesting for the consumers (e.g. by giving them a personal goal such as; in round 8 I want to have a durable car with reduced CO₂ emissions) or replace them with cards.

5.   Let the players play the game and if you need to analyze what is going on, do that afterwards.  Analysis kills the game.

6.   Make kits and play in smaller groups (this is possible only if the players are all producers). This will also speed up the game. It will not only enable the players to play more rounds but also to compare the mechanisms taking place.

7.   For the effect of government to be visible it should be based on a policy and well prepared. The calculations must be made before the start of the game. If you make different groups you can compare the effects of different policies. (e.g. of government selection pressure and non-intervention)

What did I learn?

For one thing, I learnt that designing a game is not easy. Your game must reflect reality, especially if it is a simulation from which students are supposed to learn. On the other hand you can only use a few aspects of reality, else the game becomes too complex.

Winning is important. Whereas in real life there are many dimensions, in the game there is only one; only things that help you to win the game are important. This means that as a game designer you must make the game in such a way that what you want your players to see is important must contribute to winning the game. This means that before you release the game you must (ask someone to) play it with a simple purpose; to find a shortcut to victory. If this shortcut is found when the game is played ‘for real’ it is spoilt.

Numbers matter. If the math’s are not okay the game will not work.

Now this is all about game design, but did I learn anything about the mechanisms of variety and selection? I must have, in thinking up what could happen in the car market. The events (see the previous blog) were created in view of the effects they are supposed to have on the competitive power of the car producers.  But is this learning about the mechanisms of variety and selection? I would rather say it is mining previously gained knowledge. 

The car game

Learning can be fun, playing a game can be great fun, so why not combine the two? Of course that requires a special type of game, which must have an educational element in it but which must also be fun. You cannot learn a lot if you fall asleep.

The aim of this game is to let the students experience what it is like to make decisions which affect your sustainability performance in combination with other effects, e.g. on sales and competitiveness, in a world that is dynamic and not always predictable.

Before designing the game it must be decided what message the game is to convey; must it be that sustainability pays in the end? Much as I would like to support that message, it means that the outcome of the game is manipulated so as to bring across the message. I choose not to do that and let the result be unpredictable, on the one hand because I believe this better reflects real life, and on the other hand because playing a game is more fun when the winner is to emerge from the game.

So who is the winner? This being a game for Industrial Ecology students, the winner is the one who has sold at least 25 cars and has only environmental label A cars in stock.  

This game focuses on the producers, who are each other’s competitors. All of them want to win. When we discussed the prototype of the game in class it was agreed that it is not very exciting being a consumer in this game, for how could a consumer win? In this version of the game, therefore, the players are all car producers. Consumer wishes, government decisions, economic ups and downs are all represented by cards. As there is quite some decisions to make and some accounting to do I believe it is wise to have 3 or 4 producers per game, each represented by two persons, one of whom is responsible for the accounting. It is not absolutely necessary to have a moderator, but it may be wise to have one.

To keep things simple the producers do not have to deal with different models and there is no labour unrest. There are no restraints on their production capacity, just the investment they need to make to produce the car.

At the beginning of the game all producers have a budget to make 10 cars and the technology to produce C-label cars. They can choose to use all the money to produce cars or invest some in R&D for cleaner technology. After they have invested enough in R&D (say the profit you make selling 10 cars) they have obtained the technology to produce B-label cars and with a further R&D investment they can produce A-label cars. When cars are sold and money is earned they can use it immediately to produce new cars or invest in R&D.

The price of building a cleaner car is higher, but the margin per car is also higher. (I will not go into the financial details, but if a C-label car costs 10 thousand Euros to produce it will normally sell for 11 thousand, a B-label car costs 11 thousand Euros to produce but will sell for 11.5 thousand and an A-label car will cost 12 thousand to produce but will sell for 14 thousand)

A producer that has the technology to produce B-label cars has the choice what cars to produce, B- or C-labels and of course a producer that has the technology to produce A-label cars can choose between A- B- and C-label cars.

What I hope is that the players will realize that by joining forces and sharing R&D cost they may (mutually) improve their chances of winning. Alternatively they could sell technology to others.

Producers draw cards in turn. These cards represent sales (how many cars can he sell and what label?) and external factors. If a player draws a sales card for a type of car that is not in stock in his company or for more cars than he has in stock, the next in line may sell the remaining number etc. until the number of cars that is on the card is sold. If there are not enough cars in stock the sales opportunity is lost.

Now obviously there will have to be cards indicating what type of car is to be sold and if the game is to be finished within one hour or so the cars must be sold at a certain rate, After the whole pack has been turned it can be reshuffled and used again if necessary.

I will not go into the details of the normal sales cards but concentrate on the ‘special events’ cards, which will be mixed with the sales cards. These may contain texts such as;

• ·        Economy is booming, each player sells one additional car this round
• ·        Economy is very bad, consumers go for the cheapest car. Each player sells 2 C-class cars
• ·        Consumer awareness is going up, they will buy the highest label you have available. Sales of 5 cars of the highest label you have
• ·        Tata Steel is entering the European market with a small, cheap C-label car. You can sell 5 C-label cars, but only if you reduce the price to 10.5 thousand Euros.
• ·        You are asked to supply an A-label car for the new James Bond film. Of course you will have to supply the car for free, but you will be able to sell 3 additional cars of the same type each year for the next three rounds (starting in your next turn)
• ·        There is a government tender for 10 B-label cars. They want to cut costs but still become ‘greener’
• ·        There is a change in the tax system for lease cars. This means that only B- and A-label cars are interesting for many customers. The market for C-label cars collapses. You can sell 5 C-label cars at cost price (10 thousand).  
• ·        A Chinese car is introduced in the European market. It is not only A-label, but also cheaper than your B-label car. What do you do? If you already have A-label technology you can launch an extra PR campaign, which costs 5 thousand Euros but means you can still sell 5 A-label cars, if you only have B-label you can sell 5 cars if you reduce the price by 1000 Euros.

I believe that at least the type of cars the producers have in stock should be visible in some physical form, if only a cardboard one. This visualizes the struggle for greener production. For the money it would be convenient to have Monopoly money, but a cash account will do.

What have I learnt from this? Well, at least that it is not easy to design a game and keep it simple. It is a challenge to design the game in such a manner that it can be finished within one hour and, to be honest, I am not sure that I have managed to do so, but I hope that at least I have thrown in some feasible ideas.

   

The cultural dimension in the definition of Industrial Ecology

What is Industrial Ecology?

This week’s subject is a challenging one; define Industrial Ecology in a way that fits with your national culture, and make explicit what the specific national elements in your definition are.

Is this achievable? Surfing the web you will find definitions of Industrial Ecology, but many of them are similar, to say the least. Most sources do not define but describe Industrial Ecology, for example our own Industrial Ecology LeidenDelft website, which says;

The concept of Industrial Ecology

Industrial Ecology aims at a sustainable co-existence of the technosphere and the environment. The analogy between natural and technical systems and processes is a core concept. Processes in nature, where cycles are closed and waste from one process is input for another, are models for socio-technological processes.

Source; http://ie.leidendelft.nl/what-is-ie/

Now is this a typically Dutch description of Industrial Ecology? I very much doubt it. And what is the Dutch culture? Princess Maxima’s ‘tea with one cookie’ is a striking characterization of our national culture but it does not get you very far in defining Industrial Ecology, even if the tea is from organic home grown mint.

I had better turn to Geert Hofstede, who defined the drivers in our national culture in 5 dimensions, the so-called 5-D model. In his website

http://geert-hofstede.com/netherlands.html

he defines the national cultures of 75 countries in these five dimensions and offers an opportunity to compare the scores.  

I will try and define Industrial Ecology by looking at the 5 dimensions one by one, and making an attempt at translating this into the definition of Industrial Ecology. I will start with the definition found in the website of the University of Trondheim, which I believe could also cover Industrial Ecology as we know it in LeidenDelft (and which is in the format of a definition).

"Industrial ecology is the study of the flows of materials and energy in industrial and consumer activities, of the effect of these flows on the environment, and of the influence of economic, political, regulatory and social factors on the flow, use and transformation of resources. The objective of industrial ecology is to understand better how we can integrate environmental concerns into our economic activities. This integration, an ongoing process, is necessary if we are to address current and future environmental concerns."

Source; http://www.ntnu.edu/indecol/about

This is the score of the Dutch national culture in the five dimensions, with the addition of Greece and China to have a perspective. I will copy the dimensions from Hofstede’s website and translate them into the definition.

Power distance
This dimension deals with the fact that all individuals in societies are not equal – it expresses the attitude of the culture towards these inequalities amongst us. 
Power distance is defined as the extent to which the less powerful members of institutions and organisations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed unequally.

As was to be expected, the Dutch score on this dimension is low. After all we invented the fine art of poldering. The Trondheim definition is compatible with this dimension of Dutch culture. It is fairly neutral in its wording, and it takes the position that we are to address current and future environmental concerns. This is taken to be a shared responsibility or ambition of all involved. 

    

Individualism
The fundamental issue addressed by this dimension is the degree of interdependence a society maintains among its members. It has to do with whether people´s self-image is defined in terms of “I” or “We”.
In Individualist societies people are supposed to look after themselves and their direct family only. In Collectivist societies people belong to ‘in groups’ that take care of them in exchange for loyalty.

The score shows that Netherlands is a relatively individualistic society. Does this conflict with the above? No. Individuals are expected to take care of themselves, all right, but this also means they cannot ‘hide’ in groups and must take their individual responsibilities. We are to integrate environmental concerns into our economic activities etcetera in an individualistic society reads as each one of us is to integrate environmental concerns into our economic activities, etc.

Masculinity / Femininity
A high score (masculine) on this dimension indicates that the society will be driven by competition, achievement and success, with success being defined by the winner / best in field – a value system that starts in school and continues throughout organisational behaviour.

A low score (feminine) on the dimension means that the dominant values in society are caring for others and quality of life. A feminine society is one where quality of life is the sign of success and standing out from the crowd is not admirable. The fundamental issue here is what motivates people, wanting to be the best (masculine) or liking what you do (feminine).

The definition of this dimension says more than the names. It shows a very 'feminine' score, which means that Dutch people (both men and women in my experience) find quality of life important, and are less competitive than people in many other countries. I think this may also be because most of us are well to do. It is much easier to do what you like or what you find important if you can make a decent living doing so. Industrial Ecology is a choice you make because you find it important that there is a balance between economic activities and environmental concerns. 

Uncertainty avoidance    
The dimension Uncertainty Avoidance has to do with the way that a society deals with the fact that the future can never be known: should we try to control the future or just let it happen? This ambiguity brings with it anxiety and different cultures have learnt to deal with this anxiety in different ways.  The extent to which the members of a culture feel threatened by ambiguous or unknown situations and have created beliefs and institutions that try to avoid these is reflected in the UAI score.

The Netherlands score relatively high on uncertainty avoidance. We like to make arrangements and stick to them. The worst thing politicians can be accused of is not keeping their promises and many of us still have dinner (potatoes, veggies and meat) at six o’clock. Cauliflower with satay sauce will not be appreciated by many. Now how does this translate into the definition of Industrial Ecology? Maybe it is in the study of the influences of economic, political, regulatory and social factors, so as to know what these will do and of course the ambition to address current and future environmental concerns. We like to be prepared.

Long term orientation
The long term orientation dimension is closely related to the teachings of Confucius and can be interpreted as dealing with society’s search for virtue, the extent to which a society shows a pragmatic future-oriented perspective rather than a conventional historical short-term point of view.

The Netherlands, like the other Western countries, score low on long term orientation. This means that they have a strong concern with establishing the absolute Truth, they are normative in thinking, whereas the people who are long term oriented tend to believe that the Truth depends on situation, context and time (stated by Hofstede). How does this translate into the definition? Again, it is in the final part; this integration … is necessary if we are to address current and future environmental concerns. It is stated, assumed to be obvious, that the answer to environmental concerns is to integrate them into our economic activities. (It is necessary, which is a very normative expression) But it is there more subtly as well, in if we are to address … this if is not in the case that, it includes the reader in the conviction that we are to address current and future environmental concerns, which is normative again. Now I do not mind being included in this normative wording, but that might be because I am Dutch.

The reader will not be surprised to see that the Dutch and Norwegian dimensions are very similar, as becomes clear when they are shown together.

But will the definition of Industrial Ecology be very different in universities from China, which shows very different dimension patterns? In fact, could you say where this definition is from?

	Industrial ecology is an interdisciplinary framework for designing and operating industrial systems as living systems interdependent with natural systems. It seeks to balance environmental and economic performance within emerging understanding of local and global ecological constraints. Some of its developers have called it "the science of sustainability".

It is from the universities of Stockholm and Shandong (plus several other Chinese universities). Universities from two countries which have very different scores on most of the cultural dimensions have made a single definition of Industrial Ecology. Now is this very different from the Trondheim definition? Does it show that the Chinese cultural dimensions have been taken into account as well? There are two differences I would like to highlight; the first is that in this definition there is no I or we. It defines Industrial Ecology, the industrial ecologists are invisible. In the Hofstede dimensions this could be explained by the low Chinese score on individualism. (and for the opposite, in which it is the industrial ecologists that are in the floodlights, just refer to http://www.industrial-ecology.uci.edu/). The second difference is that here Industrial Ecology is defined as a framework for designing and operating industrial systems, whereas in the Trondheim definition it is the study of …. with the objective of better understanding how … Where does this come from? I cannot explain this with the cultural dimensions attributed to China. The only guess I can make (and it is really only a theory because I do not know these universities) is that the universities who choose this definition may have the ambition to be hands on, on application. There is an industry to be designed and operated, let us get to work. I quite like that, to be honest. Maybe be it is my western world short term orientation it appeals to….

LCA, a must

Life Cycle Assessment, a must

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has been around for ages or at least for a couple of decades. An ISO standard for LCA (ISO 14040) has been established and our (Dutch) government has funded extensive research in the matter, resulting in guidance documents such as this one.

http://media.leidenuniv.nl/legacy/new-dutch-lca-guide-part-1.pdf

The site of the RIVM (http://www.rivm.nl/Onderwerpen/Onderwerpen/L/Life_Cycle_Assessment_LCA ) provides loads of information on LCA and available LCA software. And still there are companies which do not use the tool. How can government increase the use of this tool through external control and setting boundary conditions?

Government? This may be a good moment to remind the reader of the coordination mechanisms defined by Frank Boons in Self-organization and sustainability: The emergence of a regional industrial ecology (2008). Boons defines 4 categories;

1. actors can self-organize through interaction (self-organization without governmental involvement);

2. actors can self-organize and develop monitoring and sanctioning rules (self-organization leading to self-governance);

3. actors can self-organize under pressure of governmental legislation (self-organization with government providing selection pressure), termed private interest government

4. actors organize under control of governmental initiative (absence of self-organization); termed government

Assuming that although some self-organization has taken place, the result in terms of LCA is not satisfactory, what governmental initiatives could make it work? 

In this blog I will compare four governmental initiatives to increase the use of LCA, both in ”pure” government (4) and in private interest government (3), as defined by Boons.

Legislation

Government in its purest form is legislation plus enforcement. An example of this is the chemical safety assessment (CSA) in the EU REACH Regulation. The REACH Regulation (http://echa.europa.eu/web/guest/regulations/reach/legislation) requires companies manufacturing or importing more than 10 tons annually of a chemical substance to make exposure scenarios for these chemicals. These have to be calculated from the chemical properties of the substances using paradigms prescribed by the European Union. The result of this safety assessment determines whether or not the company is allowed to manufacture/produce (this quantity of) the substance.

The Regulation is applicable in the whole of the European Union and it applies to all companies that place chemicals in the EU market, so if you want to sell chemicals in the EU, there is no escaping from REACH by producing outside the EU. If the substance is produced outside the EU, still the importer will have to do the CSA. In addition to that many other countries have developed legislation similar to REACH but under different names. This means that companies are actually making the CSA. The EU has specified the software in which the information required is to be supplied to the European Chemicals Agency, which means that it is all in a uniform format, allowing the EU to aggregate the information in the future. Following the same method for the LCA would definitely increase the number of LCA being made, but there would be some disadvantages as well.

·         Making legislation for the European Union is a very time consuming process. If similar legislation were to be made for LCA it will take years before the Regulation is made and more years before it is working and enforced.

·         Setting up the infrastructure is a costly business, not only for the EU but also for the companies.

·         The national competent authorities will have to enforce the Regulation

Alternatively legislation could be by national law, but especially in smaller countries the cost of compliance could be higher for a company than the benefit of selling in the country. In addition to that, with the open borders that exist within the EU a merely national LCA obligation would be very difficult to enforce.

Environmental permit conditions

In The Netherlands the competent authorities for the environmental permits may be the municipalities or the provinces. When a company applies for an environmental permit the competent authority is entitled to setting permit conditions. The competent authorities may tune these conditions with the environmental level of the company, e.g. for companies which have an ISO 14001 environmental management system and which produce an environmental annual report special conditions may apply. A similar policy could be adopted with respect to LCA, Making LCAs would still cost the companies time and money, but now it would also bring an advantage with respect to permit conditions. [we are assuming that the intrinsic advantages of LCA have not been sufficient to convince the companies to make use of LCA] An example of such an advantage is the possibility to define improvements in terms of the complete life cycle instead of specific aspects of it, e.g. accepting increased energy consumption in the production stage if this results in reduced energy consumption in the complete life cycle. If a competent authority were to make such a policy it would take less time to obtain the first results, as the legal basis is already there (in that the competent authority is authorized to set conditions), and enforcement takes place by the same competent authority that issues the permit. This policy could result in a win-win situation between competent authority and company. Of course there would be disadvantages as well.

·         Although there is no possibility for companies to choose their competent authorities shopping around will be less difficult than in the legislation option above. It is easier to decide what to produce where if you have more than one production unit, as the competent authorities have a much smaller jurisdiction.

·         If a competent authority decides on this policy on its own the effect is limited. For a considerable effect it is necessary to combine efforts between provinces and municipalities. In that case coordination, at least on a national level, would be required.

·         The environmental permit system is for production units. Many of the products we use are produced elsewhere in the world and imported here. These would remain outside the system.

Have LCA developed by industry

The third option is a classic case of private interest government; make covenants with the sectors of industry to produce their own LCA standards, in the same way that Nedvang is organizing the Plastic Heroes campaign in the Netherlands on behalf of the industry. For most industries the national level will be too small-scale, European scale would be the minimum, as the industry sectors have grown beyond the national boundaries. Even the EU is not big enough for some industries, but it seems to me that the EU is the biggest entity that is able to achieve something. [This may sound negative, but I believe we should not rely on the United Nations for environmental matters as some of the biggest countries have not ratified the Kyoto Protocol yet.] The LCA need not be established for all sectors of industry at once, but priority sectors may be defined. The companies can bundle knowledge about their products and production in making LCAs that fit their industry sector, which would save the government time and money. For the industry sector it means they will (probably) have more freedom in giving shape to the LCA. Especially if a sector of industry is already organized it may prefer this system to having the national government or the EU set the conditions for them. Of course this system has its disadvantages, or rather uncertainties, as well;

·         The sector of industry may have more influence on the format of the LCA than is desirable

·         Having the industry take the initiative may increase their involvement, but who is going to enforce compliance? Will the competent authorities have enough knowledge/involvement to do that?

·         Will the sector of industry set targets for itself that are challenging? And will it review the targets once they are met? I believe it will still take government involvement to keep the industry ‘sharp’.

Increase company awareness and consumer awareness

This is the ‘softest’ approach of the four discussed here. In this approach the government actively promotes LCA, creates information systems such as the information on the RIVM website, develops LCA tools that are easy to use and free, organizes courses and seminars etcetera and hopes for the best, much as the Dutch government has been doing for years to discourage drinking and driving. Would this be sufficient for the industries to self-organize and start working with LCA? Even in times of plenty I doubt if it will have the desired effect. [I am thinking of the government ideals to increase the number of women in Boards of Directors of companies, which have had little effect.] I am afraid that although in general LCA is considered a good idea it just will not happen In practice.  In the difficult times that companies are experiencing today the focus is on cost and manpower reduction, so for LCA to be introduced in a company it must create a return on investment in terms of time and/or money.

Increasing consumer awareness might work in the long run, but only for consumer products and it would need to be combined with information on the product labels, which I expect will only work if defined by government; else companies may define their own labels, as they have done for health and sustainability claims which has resulted in a great many different labels which most customers do not understand (but which may look sustainable or healthy and thus boost sales).

What would work best?

Looking at the examples, they are different in scale and flexibility. The ones on a bigger scale will have a bigger range of effect, so to speak, but they may also take much longer to achieve. The softer approach may take less time to establish, but the effect may be limited.

What would make a company use LCA?

I believe that there are two ways to make companies use LCC; one is to leave them no other option and the other is to make it worth the while for them. Legislation, therefore, will work anytime, although it depends on enforcement and it will take time. If the legislation takes place at a European level it does not interfere too much with the level playing field. Legislation at a national or lower level may be hard to achieve because companies will claim reduced competitiveness.  

Legislation could also work for products instead of production, which is a big advantage in a time when many products are shipped around the globe.

In making the legislation it would be wise to consult stakeholders in the relevant industries, so they can have their say and make it workable.

What if you are a municipality or province? Then your jurisdiction is too small for legislation to be a useful tool, but you may still push a little by means of the permits and I believe that increasing awareness might help – a little.

One thing which governments of any size may do which will definitely increase the use of LCA and which can be added to any of the above is decide for themselves to use LCA as a tool in purchasing products and services. In that way the companies who wish to supply these will be given an example of the tool and they will realize that it makes a difference in their sales potential.