The Evolution of Life Cycle Assessment Approach: A Review of Past and Future Prospects

Abstract

There is consensus evidence that the thousands of years known earth's capability to sustain life has been seriously eroded, especially since the industrial revolution. Modern forms of human existence related to prompt economic development have given a massive share in the permanent degradation of the plant, its ecosystem, resources, and quality of life of its inhabitants. Consecutively, there is increasing environmental awareness in material use and its environmental impacts, resulting in the proliferation of environmental assessment tools such as Life Cycle Assessment approaches. Ever since the first approach was proposed in the 1960s, LCA has undergone robust development in both approaches and applications. It is now a well-known and widely used tool across the industry, academia, and policy. So, this paper aims to introduce the LCA hotspots in history with a highlight on the main five periods: Early years period, conception period, standardization period, elaboration period, concept period. It is vital to address the growth in the futuristic aspiration of the new methodology related to integrating Building Information Modelling (BIM) with the LCA procedure to provide real-time results in the early design stages.