Developing Product Environmental Footprint Category Rules for Olive Oil

In the context of the Communication “Building the Single Market for Green Products”, the European Commission (EC) recommends a method to measure the environmental performance of products, named the Product Environmental Footprint (PEF). The PEF is a multi-criteria measure of the environmental performance of goods and services from a life cycle perspective. Currently, 25 pilot projects test the development of Product Environmental Footprint Category Rules (PEFCRs) for various products. This paper gives an overview of the process of developing the PEFCR for olive oil. An overview of the methods and initial results of the PEF screening study that aims at identifying the most relevant environmental impacts, processes and elementary flows are presented. The screening study assesses the impacts of the average olive oil consumed in the European markets.