Sensitivity Analysis
Testing how much the results change when an assumption, a data point or a methodological choice is varied -- a different electricity mix, a different allocation rule, a longer plant…
Glossary Terms
Working definitions for the terms that recur across this project: the circular economy, water resource recovery and reuse, and the life cycle methods -- LCA, LCC and S-LCA -- that AWARE combines into one sustainability assessment. They are written for a general reader rather than for specialists.
Showing entries beginning with S.
S
Social Acceptance
The degree to which users, residents and decision-makers are willing to accept a technology or intervention. For water reuse it is often the deciding factor -- technically sound schemes have…
Social Hotspot
A stage, activity or location in a life cycle where there is a high risk of adverse social impacts, or a notable opportunity for positive ones. Hotspot screening, often with…
Social Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA)
A method for assessing the social and socio-economic effects of a product or system on the people touched by its life cycle: workers, local communities, consumers, value chain actors, society…
Stakeholder Category
In S-LCA, a group of people who share an interest in the system being assessed. The UNEP 2020 Guidelines name six: workers, local community, value chain actors, consumers, society and…
Sustainable Development
Development that meets the needs of people today without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs, in the sense set out by the Brundtland Commission in 1987. It…
System Boundary
The line that decides which processes are included in a study and which are left out. For water reuse, typical boundary questions are whether to include the sewer network, the…
System Expansion and Substitution
A way of handling multifunctional processes by widening the system to include the products it replaces. Reclaimed water used for irrigation, for example, is credited with the freshwater abstraction and…
Definitions are written for this site in plain language. The selection of terms was checked against the Life Cycle Initiative terminology (UNEP), the ILCA Common Glossary and the SimaPro LCA glossary, and against ISO 14040/14044, ISO 14046, ISO 14075 and the UNEP Guidelines for Social Life Cycle Assessment (2020).
