Environmental impact of personal consumption from life cycle perspective - A Czech Republic case study

The impact of human civilization on the environment is now obvious. With the rapidly growing human population, the problem of human consumption becomes more and more urgent. It is therefore necessary to try to change the patterns of human life and find a more sustainable way of living. To achieve the goal of sustainable society efficiently, it is crucial to identify hot spots for possible impact reduction. Even though several tools now exist, such as footprint calculators, they usually have a narrow perspective, calculating impact only on a single environmental problem. In this study, the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) method was employed, to measure the environmental impact of human consumption across the entire life-cycle as well as a wide range of impact categories. The use of LCA to identify the major problems of personal consumption is presented in a case study of an average inhabitant of the Czech Republic. Data of average personal consumption were collected and an LCA model was created in GaBi 8 software. Characterization results, obtained using ReCiPe 2016 (E) methodology, show the environmentally dominant segments of consumption which are: household energy consumption - where the dominant process is heating; and food consumption - where the dominant processes are meat and dairy production. This study provides a thorough impact analysis and identifies the hots spots, where actions should be taken. The results provide the necessary basic data for policy-makers, so that steps to reduce individual personal environmental impact can be taken. (C) 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.