Subjectivity in the consequential approach to LCA: a review about the interpretation of the concept in literature

In the early nineties a new approach to LCA started to emerge, along with a growing awareness about the importance of market aspects in environmental assessments. After some years of discussion on the topic, the term “consequential” was coined in 2001 and thereafter applied. However, even today the concept of consequential LCA, as opposed to attributional LCA, is not totally clear among practitioners, and a growing number of applications named consequential LCA includes in fact studies with completely different and subjective methods of analysis. In this work, a brief history of the concept of consequential is retraced, with the objective to understand its initial meaning and purpose, after which some examples of consequential LCA studies are presented. Eventually, it is discussed if the purposes of a consequential approach are met in case studies and final considerations on the future of consequential modelling for LCA are derived.