Guesstimating LCA

Diagram outlining an early phase LCA process

Lifecycle Analysis (LCA) is a analysis that is rapidly increasing in demand as many of the nordic countries are or will be demanding it for all projects in the coming years. A big problem in LCA calculations is that the models dont contain enough information to do a proper calculation on especially in early stages.

As outlined in the diagram above for early stages a lot of guesses on what the building consists of has to be made, 5 distinct categories where chosen: Walls, Roofs, Windows, Slabs and Foundation.

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By connecting an LCA database to Building sketcher which already does a lot of the segmenting that is needed we can quickly show an estimate of how much carbonemissons each part of the building will create and what materials are the biggest factors. As building sketcher is made to be a fast and repsonsive tool all your buildings are instantly calculated and given new values based on their form and shape.

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The connection to Building sketcher is quickly made through an excel sheet, these values can easily be changed during sketching so that the user can modify and add to the construction of each element. All that is needed is how much their emission is per kilogram of material, what the density of the material is and what conversion unit should be used.

To build the composite structure a simple percentage system is used so for example a wall consisting of 50% insulation 40% concrete 5% Wooden cladding and 5% Gypsum all these values are added in to the excel. Further on we should look at if percentages is to rigid and a millimeter composite system should be used for the building parts.