Life cycle assessment is an analysis technique used to assess the environmental burdens of products or production processes. Ecosystem services is a concept used to understand the ways functioning ecosystems support human wellbeing. Both are used to understand how anthropogenic pressures impact the environment. The integration of ecosystem services as indicators in life cycle assessment is increasingly being explored, however there are several limitations with current frameworks. A brief review of existing approaches found they incorporate ecosystem services as midpoint indicators within traditional life cycle assessment structures and aggregate these impacts under the conventional ‘areas of protection’ (i.e., groupings of impacts). These approaches typically only focus on how product systems negatively affect ecosystem service supply (predominantly through land use) and overlook how product systems use up ecosystem services to mitigate their emissions or how interventions in product systems could improve ecosystem service supply. It is argued by several authors that ecosystem services are better placed as endpoint indicators representing damage to the instrumental value of ecosystems in a manner distinct to existing life cycle assessment impact categories, so that any changes in their delivery should be assessed within a new area of protection. In this paper, the potential for an ecosystem services area of protection within life cycle assessment is explored and a novel framework for modelling endpoint characterisation factors related to ecosystem service impacts that addresses the limitations of existing approaches is presented. The proposed novel framework respects existing life cycle assessment protocols by quantifying the endpoint damage to ecosystem services from product systems alongside existing methodologies for modelling endpoint impacts to ecosystem quality (biodiversity), human health and natural resources. This approach, based on small number of pertinent end-point indicators, has potential to broaden out LCA assessments of product systems and quantify the multiple ways they impact ecosystem services.

生命周期评估是一种用于评估产品或生产过程的环境负担的分析技术。生态系统服务是一个概念，用于理解运作的生态系统支持人类福祉的方式。两者都用于了解人为压力如何影响环境。越来越多地探索将生态系统服务作为生命周期评估指标的整合，但是当前框架存在一些局限性。对现有方法的简要回顾发现，它们将生态系统服务作为中点指标纳入传统的生命周期评估结构，并将这些影响汇总到传统的“保护区域”（即影响分组）下。这些方法通常只关注产品系统如何对生态系统服务供应产生负面影响（主要通过土地使用），而忽略产品系统如何利用生态系统服务来减少排放，或者对产品系统的干预如何改善生态系统服务供应。几位作者认为，生态系统服务更适合作为端点指标，以不同于现有生命周期评估影响类别的方式表示对生态系统工具价值的损害，因此它们提供的任何变化都应在一个新的领域内进行评估。保护。在本文中，探讨了生命周期评估中生态系统服务保护领域的潜力，并提出了一个新的框架，用于对与生态系统服务影响相关的端点特征因素进行建模，以解决现有方法的局限性。拟议的新框架通过量化产品系统对生态系统服务的端点损害以及用于建模端点对生态系统质量（生物多样性）、人类健康和自然资源的影响的现有方法来尊重现有的生命周期评估协议。这种基于少量相关终点指标的方法有可能扩大对产品系统的 LCA 评估，并量化它们影响生态系统服务的多种方式。拟议的新框架通过量化产品系统对生态系统服务的端点损害以及用于建模端点对生态系统质量（生物多样性）、人类健康和自然资源的影响的现有方法来尊重现有的生命周期评估协议。这种基于少量相关终点指标的方法有可能扩大对产品系统的 LCA 评估，并量化它们影响生态系统服务的多种方式。拟议的新框架通过量化产品系统对生态系统服务的端点损害以及用于建模端点对生态系统质量（生物多样性）、人类健康和自然资源的影响的现有方法来尊重现有的生命周期评估协议。这种基于少量相关终点指标的方法有可能扩大对产品系统的 LCA 评估，并量化它们影响生态系统服务的多种方式。