ecoinvent database – Swiss LCA data developed over 30 years

The ecoinvent database is the world leading life cycle inventory data source with several thousand users in more than 40 countries. The ecoinvent data are used in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), Environmental Product Declaration (EPD), Carbon footprint (CF), Integrated Product Policy (IPP), Life Cycle Management (LCM), Design for Environment (DfE), ecolabelling and other applications.

The ecoinvent data contain life cycle inventory data of energy (electricity, oil, coal, natural gas, biomass, biofuels, bioenergy, hydropower, nuclear power, photovoltaics, wind power, biogas), materials (chemicals, metals, minerals, plastics, paper, biomass, biomaterials), waste management (incineration, landfill, waste water treatment), transports (road, rail, air, ship), agricultural products and processes, electronics, metals processing, and building ventilation.The data are available in several formats as XML or Excel. The best option for working with ecoinvent data is to use them in the specialized LCA software SimaPro. This allows for using all features of the data format and documentation.

The team of ESU-services has managed and led the conception and creation of the database system from 1998 until March 2008. This includes the first development and the introduction of Version 1.0, followed by the expansion and update work culminating in the release of version 2.2. ESU-services elaborated about 900 out of 4'000 life cycle inventory datasets of ecoinvent data v2.2. With this contribution ESU-services is the largest privately owned partner of the ecoinvent Centre.

Listen to a half hour interview (in German) on the ecoinvent database broadcasted on April 9, 2008. Download the MP3 file here.

The ecoinvent reports that are prepared by ESU-services and implemented in the ecoinvent data v2.2 (2010) and subsequent versions can be downloaded here.