Dear Colleagues,

In comparison to conventional fossil-based products, which are made from either oil or natural gas, biobased alternatives can be produced from numerous biomass resources, ranging from agricultural residues such as straw to dedicated biomass crops. This, combined with the various conversion pathways, possible intermediates, as well as end products, results in an almost endless range of biobased value chains.

This raises the question of which biomass should be used in which conversion pathway to produce which kind of biobased product. Several criteria need to be considered in this decision process. The most relevant for the implementation of novel biobased value chains is techno-economic viability. However, environmental and social performance are also of high relevance.

A major obstacle to the implementation of novel biobased value chains is the fact that many of the conversion technologies used are still only proven in the lab or at a pilot stage—they have not yet been realized at an industrially relevant scale. This leads to additional uncertainty in the decision process and raises the question of how this uncertainty can be included in the sustainability assessment of the specific biobased value chains.

The Special Issue entitled “Life Cycle Assessment: From Biomass Cultivation through to End-of‑Life Product” aims to bring together papers that demonstrate methodological approaches to the assessment of the development of biobased value chains. These papers should take into account the sustainability of all process steps, from biomass cultivation through to the product’s end-of‑life. The focus is placed not only on the economic performance but also on the environmental and social impacts of the assessed value chains and on approaches to their integrated assessment.

Dr. Moritz Wagner
Prof. Dr. Iris Lewandowski
Dr. Iris Kral
Guest Editors

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• Bioeconomy
• Novel Biobased Value Chains
• Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA)
• Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)
• Life Cycle Cost (LCC)
• Environmental Life Cycle Assessment (E-LCA)
• Techno-economic Analysis
• Prospective LCA