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Procedia CIRP 80 (2019) 458–463
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26th CIRP Life Cycle Engineering (LCE) Conference

Materials life cycle assessment of a living building

Haley Gardnera, Julissa Garciaa, Vaclav Hasika, Maureen Olinzockb,
Abdulaziz Banawic, Melissa M. Bileca*
a
University of Pittsburgh, 4200 Fifth Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, United States
b
Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy, 45 S. 23rd St, Pittsburgh, PA 15203, United States
c
King Abdulaziz University Al Ehtifalat St, Jeddah 21589, Saudi Arabia

* Corresponding author. Tel: +1 412-648-8075; fax: +1-412-624-7820. E-mail address: mbilec@pitt.edu

Abstract

Although life cycle assessment (LCA) is a valuable tool to evaluate the built environment’s impacts, many recent studies do not allocate
equal attention to each life cycle stage [1,2]. As use phase impacts decrease in high-performance buildings, the significance of other life cycle
stages increases. A process-based material LCA was performed on a living building in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to quantify impacts of other
stages. The most impactful assembly was structural, ranging from 25-51% per TRACI category. Material improvements performed reduced
carcinogen, non-carcinogen, and ecotoxicity impacts for structural (93%, 56%, and 18% respectively) and architectural materials (93%, 43%,
and 13%, respectively).
© 2019 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/)
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 26th CIRP Life Cycle Engineering (LCE) Conference.
Keywords: life cycle assessment; living building; net zero energy; net zero water; material

1. Introduction and background
1.1. High-performance buildings and their life cycle impacts
In the United States, buildings account for 39% of energy
consumption [5]. Therefore, any improvements to this sector
can have significant impacts on the reduction of energy use and
consequently greenhouse gas emissions. There has been a large
effort in recent years to design high-performance buildings in
order to reduce the energy demand of the building sector.
Looking at high-performance buildings from a life cycle
perspective (raw materials, production, use, and end-of-life), it
is observed that as the impacts from the use phase decrease, all
other life cycle stages will see a proportional increase in their
significance. Because the use phase has been found to account
for 80-90% of overall life cycle impacts of conventional
buildings, the focus on this stage is justified [1]. Although
material selection in a conventional buildings is on average
10% of its life cycle impacts, one study found that material
selection can account for up to 46% of a low-energy building’s
life cycle impacts [2]. With respect to end-of-life of materials,
one study found that the recycling of building materials could
result in a 30% decrease in the life cycle energy of a building;
because this study was performed on a conventional building,
it can be concluded that these savings would be greater for an
energy-efficient structure due to the higher significance of the
end-of-life phase [6]. This paper focuses on the material phase
of a living building life cycle assessment (LCA); a whole-
building LCA will be completed in the future.
1.2. Living Building Challenge
In 2006, the Cascadia Green Building Council launched
version 1 of the Living Building Challenge (LBC); due to
growing interest in this program over its first few years, the
Living Building Institute was formed in order to manage the

2212-8271 © 2019 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/)
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 26th CIRP Life Cycle Engineering (LCE) Conference.
10.1016/j.procir.2019.01.021

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 Haley Gardner et al. / Procedia CIRP 80 (2019) 458–463
LBC and any additional future programs. Today, Cascadia has
evolved into Cascadia Green Building Coalition and supports
the International Living Future Institute (ILFI), which
encompasses the Living Building, Product, and Community
Challenges. Each program has similar themes of enhancing
quality of life with focuses on promoting social justice,
celebrating culture, and ensuring ecological restoration [7].
Because of its extensive and interdisciplinary requirements, this
is one of the most challenging building certifications to obtain.
To demonstrate how rigorous this rating system is, as of 2017,
there are about 6,600 buildings in the world that have received
US Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and
Environmental Design (LEED) Platinum status, yet only 15 that
have received ILFI’s Full Living Certification [7,8]. Although
LEED has existed for longer, these values illustrate how
challenging and noteworthy it is to receive Living Certification.
LBC version 3.1 requirements are organized into 7 petals:
place, water, energy, health and happiness, materials, equity,
and beauty. Each petal has a series of imperatives, for a total of
20, which all must be met to achieve Living Certification. These
imperatives encompass a wide range of concepts, including net-
positive energy and water, biophilic environment, and beauty
and spirit [7]. Achieving this certification requires integrated
design strategies, community involvement, and an
unprecedented amount of communication between the
designers, manufacturers, and contractors, making it a
challenging certification process to experience.
1.3. Life cycle assessment of green buildings
In recent years, there has been an increase in studies that
focus on life cycle stages besides the use phase; there is a
growing amount of research regarding material selection and
end-of-life because the potential to decrease the environmental
impacts from embodied energy of materials is being recognized
[9-11]. Embodied energy is a significant component of a
building’s life cycle impacts and can be reduced many ways,
such as choosing greener materials or considering the end-of-
life of the products [6]. However, it is important to note that
green buildings can sometimes see an increase in embodied
energy from their complex systems, such as solar panels or
geothermal wells [12]. Researchers have therefore discovered
that there are many tradeoffs between material selection and
lower building impacts.
Selecting more sustainable materials could include choosing
materials that are locally sourced, have fewer toxins, or have a
higher recycled content, all of which have the potential to result
in lower life cycle impacts. Additionally, as for end-of-life,
recycling and repurposing cut down on overall life cycle
impacts as they results in less material being introduced into
both manufacturing processes and waste streams [13].
The USGBC, ILFI, and other green building rating system
organizations have recognized that materials have a significant
effect on building life cycle impacts and have therefore
implemented many materials requirements into their
certifications [7,8,14]. Therefore, this LCA assesses the
materials used in a living building in order to determine the
effect on of material selection on the overall building life cycle
impacts.
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2. Methods
2.1. Case study description
The Frick Environmental Center (FEC) sits on the edge of
Frick Park, the largest park in the greater Pittsburgh area. It is
a municipally-owned, public facility that is a joint venture
between the City of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Parks
Conservancy (PPC); it is meant to serve as a resource for
visitors to the park by welcoming them into the center and
subsequently ushering them out into the nearby landscape [15].
The building is comprised primarily of office space for staff as
well as classrooms, which are used for the numerous
educational events (i.e. summer camps, nature classes) hosted
by the PPC at this facility.
The FEC is a 3-story, 15,000sf building that has a primarily
steel framing and concrete foundation. Because it is net-
positive energy and water, the site contains many sustainable
systems and strategies including solar panels, geothermal
wells, a rainwater collection and purification system,
permeable pavement, passive ventilation, and daylighting.
There are four structures on site: the main building, a service
barn, and two gatehouses that date back 70 years. The
construction began in 2014 and the facility opened in 2016.
Due to the extensive sustainable features present in this
facility, it is both LEED Platinum and Certified Living by the
ILFI. Additionally, the previous structure on-site was destroyed
due to arson, providing the community with the unique
opportunity of reimagining the facility; the decision to
construct a new building with such sustainable features reflects
Pittsburgh’s commitment to creating a greener future.
This four-acre site encompasses the main building, two
historic gatehouses, a historic fountain, a service barn, an
outdoor amphitheater, and a parking lot covered by a
photovoltaic (PV) structure (see Fig. 1).
a b
c d
Fig. 1. (a) Historic fountain; (b) PV parking lot structure; (c) Main building;
(d) Historic gatehouse.
2.2. LCA methodology
As detailed by the International Organization for
Standardization (ISO), life cycle assessment consists of four
major steps: goal and scope definition, life cycle inventory
(LCI), impact assessment (LCIA), and interpretation of results
 460 Haley Gardner et al. / Procedia CIRP 80 (2019) 458–463

[16]. The goal and scope stage defines the project purpose and
system boundary. The LCI presents all of the data used for the
assessment; materials selected, energy used, and waste
generated are some of the primary flows that are measured and
assessed. The LCIA quantifies the impacts and significance of
the inventory; these impacts are then evaluated, interpreted,
and contextualized.
The primary life cycle stages of a building are raw material
extraction, material manufacturing and processing,
construction, use, and end-of-life. This LCA assesses the
material stages, as seen in Fig. 2
where building materials were counted and their totals exported
[17]. Various dimensions could be input directly into the
software, allowing for efficiency of exporting only desired
quantities. For example, the dimensions of ducts could be
added such that the total square footage is directly exported.
Although final quantities were primarily assessed by material
type, the takeoff was performed in such a way that they can also
be analyzed by totals per floor should this alternate analysis
options prove to be valuable.
As for the material attributes and composition, LEED and
LBC material submittals, Environmental Product Declarations
(EPDs), and material submittals from manufacturers were also
used to obtain specific material attributes (see Section 2.6).

2.4. Life cycle inventory

The aforementioned quantity takeoff is a critical component

of compiling a life cycle inventory. The components of each
assembly (structural, architectural, mechanical, water systems,
and energy systems) are accounted for in this inventory as seen
in Fig. 3. Each assembly is then comprised of material
subassemblies. For example, the structural assembly contains
concrete, which is composed of cement with fly ash, river
gravel, and river sand. A unit process was acquired for the
materials within each subassembly in order to ascertain impact
factors for every TRACI (Tools for Reduction and Assessment
of Chemicals and other Environment Impacts) impact category
(e.g., Global warming potential, Ecotoxicity) using the
SimaPro software [18]. Each material’s unit process is
organized in the LCI, as well as the database of origin, the
specific material, product lifespan, and any additional
information (i.e. percent breakdown when many components
comprise one material). A portion of the LCI can be found in
Table 1.
Fig. 2. Focused material scope from entire life cycle system boundary.

2.3. Material phase

Although the Living Building Challenge is an extensive

building rating system, there is room for improvement. One
area specifically is the quantification of material impacts,
including material selection and embodied energy. In LBC 3.1
(2017), there are no imperatives related to material embodied
energy; there is only one imperative that requires offsets for the
embodied energy of solely the construction phase [7]. As
previously discussed, as the use phase of high-performance
buildings decrease, all other life cycle stages increase in
significance and require more evaluation; this prompts a need
to assess building materials in greater detail in order to quantify
the changing impact distribution of building life cycle phases.
Therefore, a significant component of this LCA was the
evaluation of building material selection, which is used herein
to refer to the collective stages of material extraction,
manufacturing and processing, and transportation.
A holistic and detailed quantity takeoff was performed on
the main building of the Frick Environmental Center to obtain Fig. 3. Breakdown of each assembly and material subassembly.
accurate material totals. As-built construction documents were
provided to the research team by the contractors. These
documents were uploaded to the software On-Screen Takeoff

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 Haley Gardner et al. / Procedia CIRP 80 (2019) 458–463 461

2.5. Life cycle material impact assessment it contains any materials on what is called the Red List. Also
created by the ILFI, this list includes chemicals common in
After the LCI is complete, the impact assessment stage was building materials that have high potency with respect to
conducted using TRACI. Any attributes acquired from the environmental pollution, bio-accumulation, and negative
aforementioned product submittals were also integrated into human health impacts on construction/factory workers [7]. As
the specific material unit process, such as percent recycled these transparency efforts continue, general databases
content. Adding these additional attributes will result in a containing this updated material information are beginning to
greater accuracy of the life cycle impacts of this building. emerge; however, there is still a disconnect between the
information itself and the integration of this updated
2.6. Material quantities and attribute adjustments information into databases used during LCA. In order to
accurately determine the impacts of buildings that use greener
One issue with respect to the life cycle assessment of high- materials, it is imperative that the information used to assess
performance buildings is that unit processes present in material impacts reflects the use of these healthier products.
commercial or publicly available life cycle databases may not Therefore, an additional analysis of this whole building
be truly reflective of novel or ‘green’ materials. A common LCA was performed on preliminary material adjustments to
example of one material that has been improved over the years demonstrate how to improve the accuracy of green building
is the use of asbestos in building insulation. Once the US EPA LCAs. For this paper, structural and architectural material
and US Department of Health and Human Services declared adjustments were made. Because living building materials
asbestos a carcinogen, all new forms of it were banned [19]. cannot contain any Red List chemicals, all of these toxins’
Now, safer types of insulation are used. Because these new impacts were removed. In order to effectively remove these
alternatives are becoming a common practice, unit processes impacts, every toxin’s contributions were subtracted from each
for these materials exist in LCA databases and can be selected material’s inventory.
when appropriate. This concept of updated unit processes needs The Red List contains 21 general chemicals but is broken
to now be extended to a multitude of other materials as greener down into 815 specific chemicals. For example, the single item
options emerge. “Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and Hydrochlorofluorocarbons
Recently, there has been an increase in material (HCFCs)” encompasses 90 individual chemicals [7]. These 815
transparency, which will make it easier over time to input chemicals were queried and subsequently removed from each
material attributes into LCA databases. The ILFI created the material inventory of 2,000 chemicals; since all 10 TRACI
material transparency label called Declare wherein impact categories were assessed for both the structural and
manufactures share various features including a precise list of architectural assemblies, a total of 20 inventories were
ingredients, life expectancy, management at end-of-life, and if evaluated and adjusted.
A material tracking sheet was provided by the building
Table 1. Life cycle inventory of structural materials. designers that designates whether or not a material was Red
Each unit process comes from the ecoinvent 3 database, the service life List free (RLF) or if an exception was made; therefore, a
of each structural material is 75 years [4]. product was only adjusted if it is noted as RLF. These
Assembly Material Unit Process Notes adjustments consequently result in a more representative
Portland Cement, Portland 20% weight impact factor for the greener materials and overall more
Cement {US}, market for, accurate whole building LCA impacts.
Alloc Def, U
(No fly ash) All 10 TRACI impact categories were assessed for structural
CMU Blocks Sand {GLO} market 40% weight and architectural assemblies in order to identify where the
River Sand for Alloc Def, U
largest impact reductions are made as a result of being RLF.
Gravel, crushed, 40% weight
River Gravel {ROW}, market for, Future assessments include Red List adjustments for materials
Alloc Def, U in the MEP, water, and energy system assemblies.
Portland Cement, pozzolana 10% weight
Cement and fly ash 15-40%,
(includes fly US only, market for, 3. Results and discussion
ash) Alloc Def, U
Concrete Gravel, crushed, 30% weight 3.1. Overall LCA results of material impacts
Gravel {ROW}, market for,
Alloc Def, U
Sand {GLO} market 60% weight Based on the building material quantities and improved
Natural Sand for Alloc Def, U impact factors, results were acquired for each material
Steel
Steel, low alloyed 88.4% assembly. Table 2 shows the breakdown of each assembly for
Steel {GLO}, market for, recycled
Beams
Alloc Def, U content
a given TRACI impact category. These findings show that
Steel, low alloyed 77.6% structural components have the largest impact for each
Steel Plates Steel {GLO}, market for, recycled category, with a median contribution of 40%. However,
Alloc Def, U content materials in both the PV and mechanical systems also have
Reinforcing Steel, 99.4% weight
Steel market for, Alloc significant impacts for many of the categories, with maximum
Reinforced Rec, U contributions of 22% and 32%, respectively. These results
Steel Steel, low alloyed 0.6% weight show the hotspot areas within material impacts, which can
Steel Alloys {GLO}, market for,
Alloc Def, U provide building designers with insight when it comes to

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 462 Haley Gardner et al. / Procedia CIRP 80 (2019) 458–463

material selection; focusing on choosing more sustainable
structural materials has the potential to drastically decrease the
overall building material impacts.
Table 2. Preliminary material impact percentages, by TRACI impact
categories [3]. Impacts of the categories (Architectural, Structural,
Mechanical, Water, Geothermal, PV System) from left to right are: Ozone
depletion (kg CFC-11 eq), Global warming potential (kg CO2e), Smog (kg
O3e), Acidification (kg SO2e), Eutrophication (kg N eq), Carcinogens
(CTUh), Non-Carcinogens (CTUh), Respiratory effects (kg PM2.5e,
Ecotoxicity (CTUe), and Fossil fuel depletion (MJ surplus). Results of Red
List impact factor adjustments made for the architectural and structural
assemblies are reflected below.
GWP (%)
option, their total life cycle impacts could change. One study
compared the environmental effects of structural steel and
concrete and found that the CO2 emissions for a hollow steel
framed building were only 15% of those of a cast-in-place
concrete framed structure [20]. A similar scenario analysis will
be performed on the FEC to see how different the life cycle
impact of the structure would be if its concrete components
were replaced with steel or wood components. It should be
noted that the wood scenario will factor in biogenic carbon
impacts, as these are imperative to consider when assessing
wooden structures [21]. This scenario analysis will determine
how these three structural components compare specifically
with respect their end-of-life impacts.
Additionally, a substitution component will be explored for
the Red List material adjustments. For example, it may be the

NCar (%)

case in some materials that during a manufacturing process a

ETX (%)

FFD (%)
SFP (%)

Car (%)
Assembly

OD (%)

RE (%)
AP (%)

EP (%)

certain Red List chemical might be replaced with a different

material or process, rather than just being removed completely
A 12 9 13 14 8 1 4 17 6 16
from the system. This requires a more in-depth analysis of
S 42 51 44 33 41 43 38 36 35 25
material manufacturing but will improve the accuracy of the
M 15 14 17 23 14 18 32 16 30 20
adjusted material impact factors.
W 6 7 7 8 8 27 12 8 13 15
Additionally, once the whole building LCA is finalized, the
G 9 7 11 11 7 3 5 7 6 16
total impacts will be compared to conventional buildings, as
P 16 11 8 11 22 8 9 16 10 8
well as other certified LEED and Living Buildings. A
Σ% 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100
comparison will also be made to results from an FEC baseline,
which includes no material adjustments, to discern the
discrepancy between LCAs using standard data versus data
with material adjustments made. This will allow for a
3.2. Material improvements results for green materials discussion about which green design strategies decrease life
cycle impacts, as well as any hotspots identified in the LCA
Once the previously described material adjustments were that can further improve green building design.
performed, there were noticeable decreases in several building Finally, a statistical analysis will be performed on the whole
material impact categories. As for the structural material Red building LCA results to ensure accuracy. The Monte Carlo
List adjustments, the most substantial changes in overall method will be used in order to get deterministic values once
impacts occurred in three categories: Carcinogens (-93%), the LCA is complete.
Non-carcinogens (-55%), and Ecotoxicity (-18%), as seen in
Table 3. These reductions are a result of the decreases in the Table 3. Preliminary percent change from original to RLF total material
impact factors via subtracting contributions from Red List impacts, structural materials without replacements.
chemicals, as seen in Fig. 4. These decreases in overall total
impacts support the efforts of the ILFI and the Red List as the TRACI Impact Category Units Percent change
manufacturing of greener products is reducing impacts in the Ozone depletion kg CFC-11 eq -8.72%
categories they are targeting, namely those that affect human Global warming potential kg CO2 eq 0.00%
health and ecosystems. However, it does highlight that there is Smog kg O3 eq -0.04%
room for improvement with respect to many other categories, Acidification kg SO2 eq -0.13%
Eutrophication kg N eq -0.02%
such as global warming potential or smog production which Carcinogens CTUh -93.18%
saw little to no improvements. Therefore, it is recommended Non-Carcinogens CTUh -56.31%
that green building rating systems strive to evaluate buildings Respiratory Effects kg PM2.5 eq -0.07%
Ecotoxicty CTUe -18.44%
holistically because solely choosing RLF materials would Fossil fuel depletion MJ surplus 0.00%
result in no reduction of the material’s embodied energy of a
material, but rather exclusively its carcinogenic or ecotoxic
5. Conclusion
quality.
Now that the design of specifically low-energy buildings is
4. Future work
abundant, it is time to expand the scope of thinking from the
only the use phase to the entire building life cycle. The material
End-of-life impacts of structural materials were assessed,
impacts and end-of-life stages account for a greater percentage
and preliminary results showed that structural steel and
of the building life cycle for these high-performance structures,
concrete accounted for a significant amount of every TRACI
and efforts should now be made to further minimize these
impact category. If alternate disassembly strategies are
impacts. From the material impact assessment, it was
analyzed for these select materials, either to reflect the actual
discovered that structural components of the Frick
fate of the material or to model the least impactful disposal

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 Haley Gardner et al. / Procedia CIRP 80 (2019) 458–463
Environmental Center contribute the most significant impacts
for all TRACI impact categories; this provides potential for
design improvements moving forward since this has been
identified as a hotspot in the building life cycle impact.
A challenge faced by LCAs of buildings that are this
conscientious about their design is that there are not ample data
in assessment databases to reflect efforts made. This primarily
applies to material selection. Obtaining Living Certification
requires great effort when it comes to material selection as to
minimize toxicity and environmental impact. The material
databases to date do not include such detailed information;
therefore, whenever an LCA is performed, it does not reflect
the true total building impact and is potentially much larger.
This work seeks to incorporate these specific material attributes
into the material unit processes to obtain more accurate totals
of the whole building impacts.
In addition to material selection impacts, end-of-life impacts
must be considered as the use phase is reduced. The impacts of
steel, concrete, and wood were compared as not only are these
the three primary structural components in the building, but
steel and concrete dominate the structural assembly total
impacts; therefore, taking a closer look at these three materials
could help identify how to further minimize the impacts of the
assembly that has the largest negative environmental impacts.
This whole building LCA seeks to provide insight into the
impacts of a high-performance, living building. This work fills
a gap in literature with respect to the life cycle assessment of
living buildings because they are still emerging. Additionally,
this research sheds light on the decreased impacts as a result of
more sustainable material selection while providing insight as
how to potentially reduce the end-of-life impacts of the
building. While this assessment is specific to the FEC, the
results of the whole building LCA can be used to shift the focus
from the decreasing use phase to life cycle stages with rising
impacts.
Preliminary median percent change from original to
RLF material impact factor per TRACI category,
without replacements
OD Car NCar ETX
0%
-10%
-6%
-20% -12% -13%
-18%
-30%
-40%
-50% -43%
-60% -55%
-70%
-80%
-90%
-100% -93% -93%
Architectural Components Structural Components
Fig. 4. Median percent decrease in impact factor for each TRACI category
after removal of Red List materials.
TRACI Categories left to right: Ozone Depletion, Carcinogens, Non-
Carcinogens, and Ecotoxicity. Categories with <1% change not shown.
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463
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the University of Pittsburgh’s
Mascaro Center for Sustainable Innovation. We would like to
thank the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy for their continuous
support and guidance. This research is based on work funded
by the National Science Foundation under 1038139 and
1323190.
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