An environmental Life Cycle Assessment of Living Wall Systems

The Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a standard approach for evaluating the environmental impacts of products and processes. This paper presents the LCA of Living Wall Systems (LWS), a new technology for greening the building envelope and improve sustainability. Impacts of manufacture, operation, and use of the systems selected, were evaluated through an LCA. LWS are closely related to several environmental benefits, including improved air quality, increased biodiversity, mitigation of heat island effects, and reduced energy consumption due to savings in indoor cooling and heating. Two prototypes have been selected, taking into account the modularity and the use of organic substrate as selection criteria. The systems evaluated were a plastic-based modular system and a felt-based modular system. The inventory data was gathered through the manufacturers. The LCA approach has been used to assess the impact of these solutions by focusing on the construction phase and its contribution to both the energy balance and the entire life cycle of a building. This approach has never been done before for LWS. The study found that out of the two systems through the manufacturing, construction, and maintenance stage of the LCA, the felt-based LWS has an impact on almost 100% of the impact categories analyzed, while plastic-based LWS has the lowest influence on the total environmental impact.