Simplified Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of a semi-finished aluminium product

In the field of aluminium architectural windows and doors, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) implementations have been carried out, although these do not explicitly concern the analysis of semi-finished products, except for a small number of case studies in the framework of EPDs. For this article, a simplified LCA of a semi-finished aluminium product was carried out and a comparison with an equivalent product was proposed. The results showed that some production steps such as pre-treatment and painting seem to be the most impacting for all environmental impact categories considered, due to the chemicals used. In addition to mitigation measures towards limiting these impacts, the challenge for the near future will be to find alternative solutions that ensure both production efficiency and sustainability.