1. The value of environmental footprints Euro-Mediterranean Conference on Digital integration, energy and resource efficiency: opportunities in textile and clothing value chains across the Euro-Mediterranean Area Krakow, April 27-28, 2015 0

2. The value of environmental footprints It is about sustainability It is about actions to improve sustainability of our processes, products, organization, etc. If you want to know if you have improved, it has to be measured What and how to measure, according what criteria? But which footprint? Carbon footprint Water footprint Life cycle analysis EU PEF, EU OEF Other? Indexes? 1

3. The need to measure; LCA Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) LCA; some call it … bookkeeping of the use of the global inventory and its impacts From cradle to grave Extraction Raw materials Production Use End of life incl. other inputs So the sum of all known and considered impacts The need to weigh these impacts … But how to weigh the impacts? Are there objective criteria? How to make “the value of environmental footprints” scientifically sound??? 2

4. The need to measure; to know the impact What is the impact of what we have quantified, and on which element of the environment? How to allocate, according which study? A Life Cycle Assessment quantifies a wide range of environmental impacts… Global warming, Resource depletion, Acidification, Ozone depletion potential, Deforestation, Eutrophication, Loss biodiversity, Toxicity, Smog formation... New studies will be published, and new impacts will come up 3

5. The need to measure; moving impacts Moving priorities and changing value of single impacts As an example; Nogepa weighting results (Nogepa; Nederlandse Olie en Gas Exploratie en Productie Associatie) Environmental impact19962002 Climate change32 40 Ozone layer depletion 126 Photochemical oxidation 11 10 Acidification 178 Eutrophication 13 16 Human toxicity 15 20 Total 100 100 4

6. The need to measure; standardization and ISO According to what rules and criteria? ISO at global level, very well established and recognized Overview of ISO standards and sustainability In numerical order … ISO 14020 Environmental labels and declarations – General principles ISO 14021 Environmental levels and declarations – self declared environmental claims (Type II) Environmental and labelling ISO 14024 Environmental claims and declarations (Type I) Environmental labelling – principles and procedures ISO 14025 Environmental claims and declarations (Type III) Environmental declarations – principles and procedures ISO 14040 Environmental management – Life cycle assessment – Principles and framework ISO 14044 Environmental management – Life cycle assessment – Requirements and guidelines ISO 14067 Green House Gases – Carbon footprint of products – Requirements and guidelines for quantification and communication ISO 14072 Environmental management – Life cycle assessment – Requirements and guidelines for organizational life cycle assessment 5

7. The need to measure; ISO, but still too much freedom Many impacts and several methodologies to calculate the impact Global warming, Resource depletion, Deforestation, Impact of water use, Recycling allocation, Acidification, Eutrophication, Loss biodiversity, Toxicity …. Which study to use; extensively tested, vs. new, unused, unproven, etc. Where can I find the data? Plenty of data sources available But what about reliability of data? (Un)certainty of the result? Help! It is becoming very comprehensive, complex, time- consuming, need some help, expensive Will harmonized EU PEF be the solution? 6

8. The actual situation; LCA are needed LCA makes sense in order to: To know your deficiencies and work on continuous environmental improvement. And if needed, to provide reliable LCA data according ISO standards, … Compare environmental performances? Validity of results is questioned immediately. Action results in reaction 7

9. Conclusions and our homework There will always be moving concerns, priorities, interests and targets, and methodologies There is no panacea; not for the products, not for the LCA methodology Know the weaknesses and strong points of your products Just act … and continuously improve There will always be comparisons made Sustainability is just implementing a million actions to improve Sustainability a hype for ever; from a responsibility point of view, and a commercial/marketing one 8