- genre: lightning‑talk
- title: SLiCe - An open model for scalable high-definition life cycle assessment of buildings
- presenter: @martinroeck
- background:
Policy experts and decision makers involved with building construction and operation need to understand environmental impacts across the whole life cycle of buildings at different spatial and temporal scales, but there is a lack of practical solutions for handling high-definition life cycle data of buildings and their implementation for building stock modelling at macro-scale.
We propose the SLiCe building data model as an open interface for handling high-definition building life cycle data and are actively pursuing the development of an ecosystem for SLiCe implementation in research and decision-making practice.
First practical applications of the SLiCe data model include: a) the SLiCe building LCA model (developed in ongoing research projects for the European Commission on modelling the whole life carbon emissions of the European building stock 2020-2050), a highly parametrized model for building life cycle assessment using hierarchical modelling of life cycle inventories with explicit representation of materials, worksections, elements and the building level, implemented using a central SQL database and Python scripts for data loading, calculation and interpretation/visualization, as well as; b) the SLiCe hotspot analysis tool, which offers an implementation of SLiCe data for analysis along the PEF/OEF hotspot analysis protocol in an interactive assessment tool using IPython JupyterNotebooks with interactive UI elements.
The open SLiCe building data model can be elaborated to include spatial attributes at higher and lower scale levels, increase the resolution of temporal life cycle information, and to capture additional indicators. SLiCe offers an open interface for researchers and industry professionals for joint elaboration and development towards scalable, high-definition LCA of buildings and building stocks.