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Program Brief

The Impact Assessment and Measurement (IAM) team is advancing the scientific understanding and application of impact assessment and measurement methodologies to address a wide range of environmental protection issues that endanger human health and the environment through the development, and dissemination of high quality research, and through the development of tools to aid in these assessments.

The Team Vision is to influence environmental decision making through the research, development, and application of environmental impact assessment and progress measurement. The team conducts research which leads to an increasing ability of environmental decision making to incorporate impact assessment methodologies which reflect the actual impacts experienced by the environment and which allow the analysis of the uncertainty involved in the environmental decision. Current projects include the development of the decision framework, impact assessment methodologies, tools, and supporting data for environmental decision making.

Environmental Decision-making Support

Environmental decision making for programs in pollution prevention (P2), life cycle assessment (LCA), and sustainable development requires comprehensive impact assessments which allow decision makers to incorporate a wider range of impact categories and life cycle stages. Ideally an impact assessment should be comprehensive and sophisticated in all dimensions. In reality, every study is limited in resources, and thus must also be limited in some dimensions. Conducting the appropriate level of sophistication and comprehensiveness for each impact assessment is key to effective environmental decision making. If the study planned is too comprehensive or sophisticated, the limited resources will prohibit completion of the study. If a narrow and/or too simplistic framework is defined, the assessment can lead to incorrect decisions, either by relying on gross and inaccurate modeling and data assumptions (leading to large uncertainties), or by failing to address the many factors involved.

Decision-support tools are being developed with impact assessment methodologies incorporated into the decision-support framework. The research and development of the environmental framework, impact assessment methodology development, and tool development will be made available for application. The framework recognizes that tradeoffs are involved in nearly every environmental decision, and therefore, defining a consistent framework requires the development of values that reflect environmental priorities. The decision support tools recommend, and provide guidance for, conducting the discernment process to determine these values. The tools provide a very significant step by allowing consistency in environmental decision-making - a necessity for true environmental progress.

Publications

Peer Reviewed Journal Articles and Chapters

  1. Bare, J.C. and T.P. Gloria. (2007). “Environmental Impact Assessment Taxonomy Providing Comprehensive Coverage of Midpoints, Endpoints, Damages, and Areas of Protection.” Journal of Cleaner Production, Available online July 27.
  2. Bare, J.C., T.P. Gloria, and G. Norris. (2006). “Development of the Method and U.S. Normalization Database for Life Cycle Impact Assessment and Sustainability Metrics.” Environmental Science and Technology, 40, 16.
  3. Bare, J.C. and T.P. Gloria. (2006). “Critical Analysis of the Mathematical Relationships and Comprehensiveness of Life Cycle Impact Assessment Approaches.” Environmental Science and Technology, 40, 4.
  4. Bare, J.C. (2006). “Risk Assessment and Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) for Human Health Cancerous and Noncancerous Emissions: Integrated and Complementary With Consistency Within the U.S. EPA.” Human and Ecological Risk Assessment, 12, 3.
  5. Jolliet, O., R. Müller-Wenk, J. Bare, et al. (2004). “The LCIA Midpoint-Damage Framework of the UNEP-SETAC Life Cycle Initiative.” International Journal of LCA, 9, 6.
  6. Bare, J.C., G.A. Norris, D.W. Pennington, and T. McKone. (2003). “TRACI – The Tool for the Reduction and Assessment of Chemical and Other Environmental Impacts.” Journal of Industrial Ecology, 6, 3.
  7. Pennington, D.W., J.C. Bare, R. Knodel, et al. (2003). “Evaluating Pollution Prevention Progress (P2P) III: An Environmental Tool for Screening in Product Life Cycle Assessment and Chemical Process Design.” Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy, 5, 2.
  8. Hofstetter, P., J.C. Bare, J.K. Hammitt, et al. (2002). “Tools for the Comparative Analysis of Alternatives: Competing or Complementary Perspectives?” Risk Analysis, 22, 5.
  9. Hertwich, E.G., D.W. Pennington, and J.C. Bare. (2002). “Introduction.” Presentation, Society for Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, Europe 2002, Life Cycle Impact Assessment: Striving Toward Best Available Practice, Vienna, Austria, May 12–16.
  10. Finnveden, G., P. Hofstetter, J.C. Bare, et al. (2002). “Normalization, Grouping, and Weighting in Life Cycle Impact Assessment.” Presentation, Society for Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, Europe 2002, Life Cycle Impact Assessment: Striving Toward Best Available Practice, Vienna, Austria, May 12–16.
  11. Pennington, D.W., G. Norris, T. Hoagland, and J. Bare. (2001). “Metrics for Environmental Comparison of Process and Product Alternatives in a Holistic Framework.” In: Process Design Tools for the Environment, Edited by S.K. Sikdar and M.M. El-Halwagi. Taylor and Francis, U.K.
  12. Pennington, D.W. and J.C. Bare. (2001). “Comparison of Chemical Screening and Ranking Approaches: The Waste Minimization Prioritization Tool (WMPT) vs. Toxic Equivalency Potentials (TEPs).” Risk Analysis, 21, 5.
  13. Bare, J., J. Fava, E. Hertwich, et al. (2001). “The Areas of Protection Debate.” In: Global LCA Village, Gate to Environmental and Health Science (EHS). Edited by W. Klöpffer.
  14. Bare, J.C., P. Hofstetter, D.W. Pennington, and H.A. Udo de Haes. (2000). “Life Cycle Impact Assessment Midpoints vs. Endpoints – The Sacrifices and the Benefits.” International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, 5, 6.
  15. Pennington, D.W., G.A., Norris, T. Hoagland, and J.C. Bare. (2000). “Environmental Comparison Metrics for Life Cycle Impact Assessment and Process Design.” Environmental Progress, 19, 2.
  16. Bare, J.C., H.A. Udo de Haes, and D.W. Pennington. (1999). “Life Cycle Impact Assessment Sophistication.” International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, 4, 5.

Other Publications

  1. Bare, J.C. and T.P. Gloria. (2005). “A Closer Look at Life Cycle Impact Assessment for the Building Design and Construction Industry.” Building Design and Construction, November.
  2. Hofstetter, P., B.C. Lippiatt, J.C. Bare, and A.S. Rushing. (2002). User Preferences for Life Cycle Decision Support Tools: Evaluation of a Survey of BEES Users.” NISTIR 6874.
  3. Bare, J.C. (2002). “Developing a Consistent Decision-Making Framework by Using the U.S. EPA’s TRACI.” Presentation, American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Annual Meeting, Indianapolis, IN, November 3–8.
  4. Bare, J.C. and G.A. Norris. (2002). “General Activity of LCA in the USA.” Presentation, Research Center for Life Cycle Assessment, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) Meeting, Tsukuba, Japan.
  5. Bare, J.C., D.W. Pennington, and H.A. Udo de Haes. (2000). “Implications of Inventory Structure for Life Cycle Impact Assessment and Uncertainty Analysis.” Presentation, Life Cycle Impact Assessment Sophistication: An International Workshop, July. EPA/600/R-00/023.

Other Contributions

  1. Udo de Haes, H.A. and E. Lindeijer. (2002). “Areas of Protection, The Areas of Protection in Life Cycle Impact Assessment.” Final draft chapter in: Global LCA Village, Gate to Environmental and Health Science (EHS). Edited by W. Klöpffer.
  2. Udo de Haes, H.A. (2001). “Areas of Protection.” Third draft chapter in: Global LCA Village, Gate to Environmental and Health Science (EHS). Edited by W. Klöpffer.
  3. International Organization of Standardization (ISO). (2000). “Environmental Management – Life Cycle Assessment – Life Cycle Impact Assessment.” International Organization of Standardization, Geneva, Switzerland. International Standard ISO14042:2000(E).
  4. Udo de Haes, H.A. (1998). “ISO’s Compromise on Comparative Assertions in Life Cycle Impact Assessment.” Journal of Industrial Ecology, 2, 3.

Office of Research & Development | National Risk Management Research Laboratory

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