Performance design of the building envelope in Life Cycle Assessment evaluations

The research area of interest concerns the development of Life Cycle Assessment evaluations of building products and processes, focused on the achievement of guidelines useful in orientate interventions towards high levels of sustainability and energy efficiency, during their whole life cycle. In particular, the paper proposes a recognition of results obtained within several LCA evaluations on the building envelope components and aims to clarify the environmental impacts related to design assumptions that are different for the nature of the materials and the employed technologies, the expected performance levels, the usage and maintenance needs, the location in the territory, the reconfigurability potential during the time and the final disposal. The interpretation of these results identifies a scenario of the possible strategies for the design and the final building environmental improvement.