Course overview

Life Cycle Assesment is a holistic methodology that has become the de facto tool for the study of sustainability in products and services. Because of this, the advancement of this methodology has allowed it to be considered as a fundamental part of the design of public policies around the world. LCA studies can become increasingly complex, especially due to the need to systematize the construction of Life Cycle Inventories (LCI), or to integrate LCA with other scientific methodologies. Fortunately, in recent years, the development of open source computational tools has allowed the emergence of an ecosystem of libraries that seek to expand the limits of conventional LCA. This is the case of Brightway: one of the most widely used open source libraries in Python language to perform LCA calculations programmatically.

The objective of this course is to provide an introduction to Brightway and the ecosystem of libraries developed based on it. The course will provide the fundamental knowledge that participants need to perform essential LCA calculations (impact assessment, uncertainty, parameterization, etc.), but will also show how these are often integrated into more advanced case studies (mathematical optimization, machine learning, etc.).

The course is aimed at students, academics or professionals with advanced knowledge of LCA, but with interest in starting to perform LCA calculations programmatically.

Location

The summer school will be held on OpenPUCP, San Miguel, Lima

Python prerequisite

Basic understanding of Python is needed for the school. If you aren't a programmer, don't worry - most participants aren't either. You are welcome, and based on previous feedback we have adapted the course content to make the school more beginner-friendly. Please do complete a basic Python tutorial before the course, though - there are many good online options available.

Starting and ending times

The school starts at 9:00 on Monday, February 3rd, and finishes at 16:00 on Friday, February 7th, though all students are invited to a social event on Friday evening.

Language

The summer school will be in Spanish.

Course fees

Students wishing to participate pay no fees, but the meals and accomodation are not paid by the organizers.

The school is organised by Départ de Sentier, a Swiss nonprofit association which supports open sustainability assessment and public engagement, together with PUCP, PELCAN group.

Registration

Registrations are closed now.