Roland Hischier

Empa - Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology | Empa · Technology and Society Lab

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) calculations of products containing nanomaterials are limited in their comprehensiveness by the lack of characterization factors linking nanomaterial emissions to their impacts on human health. This is mainly due to the scarcity of animal toxicological data compared to the number of existing nanomaterials, a constraint t...

The present study compares conventional printed circuit boards (having glass-fibre and epoxy substrates and etched copper circuits) with paper-based printed electronics (offering flexible, bio-based, and biodegradable substrates with circuit design printed using silver-based inks) and assesses the relevance of e-waste recycling to the latter's sust...

Novel printed electronics are projected to grow and be manufactured in the future in large volumes. In many applications, printed electronics are envisaged as sustainable alternatives to conventional (printed circuit board-based) electronics. One such application is in the semi-quantitative drug detection and point-of-care device called 'GREENSENSE...

Printed electronics are manufactured using additive methods and are envisioned as "green", low-cost, energy-efficient, and sustainable alternatives to present-day electronics. The present Multi-perspective Application Selection (MPAS) assessment aims to assess the current state of technology and evaluate the products in which applications of printe...

5G mobile networks are intended to meet the increasing requirements placed on mobile communications. Producing and operating 5G infrastructure causes direct effects on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Meanwhile, 5G is expected to support applications that contribute to GHG abatement. We investigated (i) the GHG footprint of 5G infrastructure, and (i...

To stabilize the climate, we need to urgently decarbonize our society and remove excess CO2 from the atmosphere. Ambitions for the transformation are ultimately limited by bio‐physical constraints, which cannot be transgressed even if all economic and societal obstacles could be overcome. Even though it is essential to know what transformation path...

The environmental impacts of all supply chains are of great importance for the current climate change mitigation goals. Among the key supply chains is that of natural gas (NG), which has been envisaged as an enabler for the transition into future scenarios where dependence on fossil fuels is reduced or completely eliminated. Within the NG supply ch...

Among the many anthropogenic applications of ammonia, its most important role (and on which the sustainability of modern societies strongly depends) is in the food production chain. Current efforts seek to reduce reliance on fossil fuels in key supply chains, although certain renewable resources remain difficult to frame into adequate production co...

In order to achieve the CO 2 targets stipulated within the Paris Agreement, future buildings must be constructed in such a way, that their emission profile will be close to zero. In order to achieve this, a radical shift towards a circular construction manner which encompasses topics like material reuse (i.e. design for multiple lifecycles), design...

Today’s scarcity of animal toxicological data for nanomaterials could be lifted by substituting in vivo data with in vitro data to calculate nanomaterials’ effect factors (EF) for Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). Here, we present a step-by-step procedure to calculate in vitro-to-in vivo extrapolation factors to estimate human Benchmark Doses and subseq...

The present article introduces the SPOTTER approach, a novel way to assess supply disruption impacts along the supply chain in the short-term (i.e. the next 5 years) and the medium-term (i.e. in 5 to 15 years) within the Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment framework. This approach allows finding the more important supply risks within global supply...

In light of increasing public pressure, retailers strive to remove plastic packaging as much as possible from fresh fruits and vegetables to reduce the environmental impacts along their supply chains. Plastic packaging, however, also has an important protective function, similar to the fruit's peel. For cucumbers transported from Spain and sold in...

The growing number of nanomaterials being produced represents a challenge for the assessment of their toxicity impacts in life cycle assessment (LCA). The human toxicity effect factor, indicating the population incidence risk caused by chemical exposure, is traditionally estimated from in vivo animal test data; however, this kind of study is being...

The informal e-waste recycling sector has potential for both harmful environmental releases and environmental benefits associated with avoided emissions from recovered materials. Four household appliances (washing machine, refrigerator, Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) television, fan) were selected for a combined Material Flow Analysis and Life Cycle Assess...

Prospective life cycle assessment (LCA) studies are widely used for evaluating emerging resource recovery systems. Simulations, engineering-based process calculations and stoichiometric methods are frequently used methods to generate life cycle inventory (LCI) in prospective LCAs. The engineering-based upscaling calculation is an efficient method f...

Having transformed our way of life, rechargeable batteries are poised for exponential growth over the coming decade, notably due to the wider adoption of electric vehicles. An international expert panel proposes a combination of vision, innovation and practice for feasible pathways toward sustainable batteries.

When designing a product, many decisions are made that determine the environmental impacts that the product will eventually exert on our planet. Therefore, it is paramount to have considered the environmental performance already in the design phase. In this contribution, we showcase the application of the recently developed resource pressure (RP) m...

Expectations for safer and sustainable chemicals and products are growing to comply with the United Nations and European strategies for sustainability. The application of Safe(r) by Design (SbD) in nanotechnology implies an iterative process where functionality, human health and safety, environmental and economic impact and cost are assessed and ba...

Earth's atmospheric CO2 concentration is on the rise, currently exceeding 420ppm. This is far above the 180ppm to 280ppm range of the past one million years and the anticipated safe limit of 350ppm. Consequently, halting fossil carbon emissions is necessary but insufficient to navigate to a safe climate future - massive and permanent removal of CO2...

Primary resource consumption is a main driver for global environmental change, including the climate crisis. Hence, reaching climate targets requires material production to change significantly. For the global scale, we have developed the Ecological Resource Availability (ERA) method quantifying primary resource budgets. If those budgets are respec...

Microplastics are ubiquitous in ecosystems and a lot of research is being performed to understand their environmental fate and effects on organisms. However, the release and impact of MP has so far not been considered in LCA studies. This is due to missing information on the inventory side about microplastic releases and missing Characterization Fa...

In light of increasing public pressure, retailers strive to remove plastic packaging as much as possible from fresh fruits and vegetables to reduce the environmental impacts along their supply chains. Plastic packaging, however, also has an important protective function, similar to the fruit's peel. For cucumbers transported from Spain and sold in...

Moving towards safe and sustainable innovations is an international policy ambition. In the on-hand manuscript, a concept combining safe by design and sustainability was implemented through the integration of human and environmental risk assessment, life cycle assessment as well as an assessment of the economic viability. The result is a nested and...

Electric vehicles are gaining increasing room in the global market, since they are seen amongst the most promising solutions to cope with the growing concerns related to climate change and environmental pollution. The successful evolution of the transportation sector towards electro-mobility depends on the battery chemistry and technology, and its...

The textile industry is recognized as being one of the most polluting industries. Thus, the European Union aims to transform the textile industry with its “European Green Deal” and “Circular Economy Action Plan”. Awareness regarding the environmental impact of textiles is increasing and initiatives are appearing to make more sustainable products wi...

The textile industry has lately started exploring the possibility of bio-sourcing for synthetics, notably polyester fiber, in the effort to break from the proven fossil-fuel dependency and decrease the environmental impacts. Traditionally made out of fossil-based polyethylene terephthalate polymer, polyester can be functionally substituted with thr...

Cotton t-shirts are a basic clothing item that everyone possesses. To date, no studies have taken into account the consumers’ perspective, even though they can play an important role regarding the actual environmental impact of their clothing items. Therefore, a life cycle assessment study was performed in order to inform the public about the envir...

Purpose This study compares prior life cycle assessment (LCA) studies on graphene-based materials (GBMs) with new results from original data on ball milling of few-layer graphene. The analysis thus offers an overview of the current state of knowledge on the environmental sustainability of GBM production. Possible future development pathways and kno...

Extraction, processing and final disposal of primary resources is responsible for a major share of global environmental burdens, many of which are already beyond safe limits today. Design is pivotal for defining the quality and quantity of resources that are required as an input to produce a product (or service) as well as the generated output by i...

The last decade witnessed an increasing global adoption of electric vehicles. Moreover, the nickel-cobalt-manganese battery chemistry has gained wide acceptance among manufacturers of electric vehicles in Europe. Nevertheless, the environmental impacts associated with recycling this battery technology have not been fully investigated. Therefore, a...

The chapter shows how the environmental sustainability of engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) and/or products containing such materials can be assessed with the support of the life cycle assessment (LCA) framework. LCA is a well-established and developed framework to assess the (environmental) sustainability of new materials and technologies. Following...

With the COVID-19 pandemic, wearing facemasks became common. Many initiatives arose to develop new types of reusable textile masks in order to overcome a shortage of surgical masks for the health care personnel and for the civil society. Having such high demand of facemasks raises the question about what factors define their environmental sustainab...

The ecological resource potential (ERP) method allows to calculate the amount of one material that can potentially be produced within Earth system boundaries, if no other anthropogenic activity would take place. It indicates the uppermost potential of one resource extracted, processed and disposed after use with a specific set of technologies and a...

One key strategy which can be used to promote a Circular Economy is ‘reuse’. This is particularly relevant for Electrical and Electronic Equipment due to its often rather short use phase as well as its resource-intensive production phase. The present study aimed to investigate the environmental and economic relevance of promoting the reuse of (wast...

5G mobile networks and greenhouse gas emissions Requirements placed on mobile networks in terms of number and types of connected devices, data volumes and types of supported applications are increasing. 5G mobile networks, the roll-out of which is currently discussed in politics, industry and academia, are intended to meet these increasing requirem...

The implementation of Safe(r) by Design (SbD) in industrial innovations requires an integrated approach where the human, environmental and economic impact of the SbD measures is evaluated across and throughout the nanomaterial (NM) life cycle. SbD was implemented in six industrial companies where SbD measures were applied to NMs, nano-enabled produ...

Non-technical summary Resources are the basis of our economy and their provision causes major shares of the global environmental burdens, many of which are beyond safe limits today. In order to be sustainable, our economy needs to be able to operate within those boundaries. As resources are the physical ‘currency’ of our economy, we present a metho...

The substitution of material-based services with digital services—for example films or music—alters the environmental impact of our everyday activities and shifts visible material use to less visible digital services. A holistic life cycle assessment (LCA) of digital transformation requires the assessment of information and communication technology...

Modern cities emerged as the main accumulator for primary and waste materials. Recovery of both types from buildings after demolition/disassembly creates a secondary material stream that could relieve pressure from primary resources. Urban mining represents this circular approach, and its application depends on redefining current construction pract...

The last 10 years of research in the field of life cycle assessment (LCA) have unveiled many possible pathways to consider the effects of temporal variations from supply chains on the assessment of potential environmental impacts for products, services and markets with dynamic LCA (i.e. DLCA) frameworks. In this context, defining “useful” levels of...

Assessing the environmental impact due to consumption of goods and services is a pivotal step towards achieving the sustainable development goal related to responsible production and consumption (i.e. SDG 12). Household appliances plays a crucial role and should be assessed in a systemic manner, namely considering all life cycle stages, technologic...

Circular Economy (CE) is the buzzword of today, promising an economy able to prosper on limited resources by closing material cycles. However, there is no guarantee that simple strategies of material cycling, as propagated by the various definitions of this concept, will indeed lead to an economy able to manage the world's resources, pollution and...

The practicality of adopting Life Cycle Assessment to support decision-making can be limited by the resource-intensive nature of data collection and Life Cycle Inventory modelling. The number of chemical products increases continuously, and long-term analyses show that overall growth of chemicals production and demand as well as faster growth in em...

In line with the 3R concept, nanotoxicology is shifting from a phenomenological to a mechanistic approach based on in vitro and in silico methods, with a consequent reduction in animal testing. Risk Assessment (RA) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodologies, which traditionally rely on in vivo toxicity studies, will not be able to keep up with t...

The major theme of the NRC report “Toxicity Testing in the Twenty-first Century” is to replace animal testing by using alternative in vitro methods. Therefore, it can be expected that in the future in vivo data will be replaced with in vitro data. Hence, there is a need for new strategies to make use of the increasing amount of in vitro data when d...

Requirements placed on mobile networks in terms of number and types of connected devices, data volumes and types of supported applications are increasing. 5G mobile networks, the roll-out of which is currently discussed in politics, industry and academia, are intended to meet these increasing requirements. Rolling out network infrastructure is not...

The Consumer Footprint is a set of life cycle assessment (LCA) indicators aimed to measure the environmental impact of an average European Union (EU) citizen. The Consumer Footprint encompasses 5 areas of consumption, namely food, mobility, housing, household goods, and appliances. For each of the areas of consumption, a basket of products (BoPs) h...

This study proposes a method to estimate the appropriability of renewable energy resources at the global scale, when Earth system boundaries/needs and the human demand for chemical energy are respected. The method is based on an engineering approach, i.e., uncertainties of parameters and models are considered and potentials calculated with 99% conf...

In 2016, Empa inaugurated NEST ("Next Evolution in Sustainable Building Technologies"), a new type of building that expedites the innovation process by providing a platform where new developments in the built environment can be tested, verified and demonstrated under realistic conditions. One of the units within is the "Urban Mining and Recycling"...

Graphene and its derivatives are heralded as ‘miracle’ materials with manifold applications in different sectors of society from electronics to energy storage to medicine. The increasing exploitation of graphene-based materials (GBMs) necessitates a comprehensive evaluation of the potential impact of these materials on human health and the environm...

The aim of this paper is to present a new, integrative approach for calculating Fate Factors (FF) for nanomaterials by combining the USEtox2.0 modelling framework with SimpleBox4Nano (SB4N), an advanced environmental fate model for nanomaterials, and to demonstrate its application to life cycle assessment (LCA) by the estimation of characterisation...

Which way of purchasing your clothes results in the lowest environmental impacts: “running” into the next big city to “plunder” the various clothing stores, or searching through a plethora of online shops and ordering your next shirt directly to you at home? So far, no such comparison has been published. The aim of this study is to get a first basi...

We present results of early stage sustainability evaluation of two development strategies for new, nano‐scale cathode materials for Li‐ion batteries: (i) a new production pathway of existing material (LiCoO2), and (ii) a new nanomaterial (LiMnPO4). Nano‐LiCoO2 was synthesized via a single source precursor route at lower temperature with a shorter r...

We present here a new eco-efficiency process improvement method to highlight combined environmental and costs hotspots of the production process of new material at a very early de-velopment stage. Production specific and scaled-up results for life cycle assessment (LCA) and production costs are combined in a new analysis to identify synergetic impr...

For over a decade, life cycle assessment (LCA) has been recognized as a valuable tool for systematically evaluating the potential environmental impacts of manufactured nanomaterial (MNMs) during their complete life cycles. Evidence for its emerging role in the field can be seen in the increasing number of LCA studies that have been published in rec...

Status and outlook of the project

Various review studies about Life Cycle Assessment in the area of nanotechnology in recent years have showed the same challenges for a coherent and sound application of this popular sustainability assessment tool in order to evaluate the (ecological) sustainability of nano-enabled applications – the use of an adequate functional unit, respective li...

In this paper, we discuss the derivation of respiratory health effect factors (HEFs) for use in Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) for five nanoparticles: nanosilver, nano TiO2, carbon black, high-aspect ratio, rigid MWCNT and flexible MWCNT. For this purpose, we applied the methodology of USEtox™, a consensus model to calculate human toxicity and...

Currently, a noncomprehensive understanding of the physicochemical properties of carbon-based nanomaterial (CBNs), which may affect toxic effects, is still observable. In this study, an exploratory systematic investigation into the key physicochemical properties of multiwall carbon nanotube (MWCNT), single-wall carbon nanotube (SWCNT), and C60-full...

Purpose The increasing use of engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) in industrial applications and consumer products is leading to an inevitable release of these materials into the environment. This makes it necessary to assess the potential risks that these new materials pose to human health and the environment. Life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology h...

Which is better for the environment: print or electronic media? The answer, it turns out, is not always obvious. What is more important is how the printed materials or IT equipment are used. The best option is to share printed materials with other people, and not to print out electronic documents. Every year, approximately 30 million sheets (or 92...

Life cycle assessments (LCA) of an early research state reaction process only have laboratory experiments data available. While this is helpful in understanding the laboratory process from an environmental perspective, it gives only limited indication on the possible environmental impact of that same material or process at industrial production. Th...

The fast penetration of nanoproducts on the market under conditions of significant uncertainty of their environmental properties and risks to humans creates a need for companies to assess sustainability of their products. Evaluation of the potential benefits and risks to build a coherent story for communication with clients, authorities, consumers,...

Plastics play an increasingly important role in reaching the recovery and recycling rates defined in the European WEEE Directive. In a recent study we have determined the life cycle environmental impacts of post-consumer plastics production from mixed, plastics-rich WEEE treatment residues in the Central European plant of a market-leading plastics...

Integrating engineered nanoparticles (ENPs) into facade coatings is expected to offer considerable potential for improved or novel functionality, or even several functionalities at the same time (multifunctional materials). Little information is available about the tangible use of ENPs in facade coatings and the real improvements that their functio...