Quantifying the environmental burden of holiday gifts via a screening LCA

The environmental impact of consumption is concerning in a world of finite resources with an increasing global population. This impact is even more concerning when it includes the purchase of non-necessities, like holiday... [ view full abstract ]

The environmental impact of consumption is concerning in a world of finite resources with an increasing global population. This impact is even more concerning when it includes the purchase of non-necessities, like holiday gifts. Some research on gifts has found a loss associated with gifts when the giver purchases an item that is less valuable to the recipient than the purchase price (deadweight loss). While some gifts have a welfare gain, any welfare loss associated with gifts is concerning due to concomitant environmental and social impacts of gift production. This study quantifies the deadweight loss or welfare gain associated with different gifts by surveying 1000 individuals about the price they would have paid for holiday gifts they received. Alongside this quantification of gift value, we also compare gifts based on environmental impact using life cycle assessment. Life cycle assessment is a technique used to assess the environmental impacts associated with all the stages of a product’s life from material raw extraction through disposal or recycling. We use a screening life cycle assessment that combines published literature and data from OpenLCA databases (EcoInvent 3.3, USDA, Agribalyse, and GABI) to compare environmental burdens (impacts) of four common holiday gift categories: books, blu-ray disks, Barbie dolls, and sweaters. We defined a representative functional unit for each gift category. Each functional unit included one year of use. For the DVD, the use phase included two viewings of the video (assumed to be 2 hours in duration). For the book, we assumed the recipient read the 0.85 kilogram book once. For each of the four sweaters, we assumed a mass equal to the mean of 117 sweaters massed in December 2016. For each of the four sweater types (one of 100% wool; one of 100% acrylic; one of 100% cotton; and one of one of a 60% cotton and 40% polyester mix), we assumed that the sweater was worn every other week for 5 months and washed after each use. For the Barbie doll, we used the average mass of 5 of plastic dolls. We hypothesized that the DVD would have the largest impact due to the environmental burden of movie production and that Barbie dolls would have the lowest impact since the use phase involved no additional environmental burdens. This study represents a relatively novel combination of economics and engineering to better inform consumption decisions.