Life cycle-based sustainability indicators for electricity generation: A systematic review and a proposal for assessments in Brazil

The global economy is advancing towards a low-carbon future. Alongside this energy transition, the sustainability concept has become a fundamental value of our society, encouraging a worldwide discussion on the consideration of socio-environmental issues by the energy sector. In Brazil, the electricity generation expansion planning has not been doing enough to incorporate these issues into its decision-making process, especially in regards to alternative and renewable energy sources. Considering that Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA) is suitable for addressing this situation, we focus on one of its first steps, which consists of defining a set of indicators able to communicate sustainability issues. With this in mind, this paper aims at incorporating sustainability into the decision-making process concerning electricity generation in Brazil by formulating a set of indicators. We carry out a systematic review for collecting the leading environmental, social, and economic indicators used by scientific papers focused on recent and practical LCSA studies concerning electricity generation and that contemplate alternative and renewable energy sources. Thus, we analyze the frequency of indicators in a sample of 41 papers and screen them against selection criteria and their relevance for the Brazilian context. As a result, we establish a set of 28 indicators (18 environmental, four social, and six economic). It is clear from our findings that LCSA practitioners have been facing different levels of methodological and practical challenges depending on the dimension of sustainability, which reflects on the number of environmental, social, and economic indicators collected from the overall sample.

Automated summary

This study focuses on formulating a set of indicators to incorporate sustainability into the decision-making process concerning electricity generation in Brazil. Through a systematic review of scientific papers, a set of 28 indicators (including 18 environmental, 4 social, and 6 economic indicators) was established. The research shows that LCSA practitioners have encountered various levels of methodological and practical challenges in energy development, which is reflected in the number of environmental, social, and economic indicators collected from the overall sample.