Life Cycle Assessment and Product Category Rules as supporting tools in evaluating product sustainability: the case of upholstery furniture

In the upholstered furniture sector, manufacturers are increasingly required to provide information on the environmental performance of their products. As a result, an important challenge is to bring environmental and economic considerations into line with principles of sustainable development. This paper studies the sustainable design and re-design of products in the upholstered furniture sector within the framework of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Product Category Rules (PCR) needed for an environmental product declaration. The environmental hotspots in the life cycle of a sofa and environmental design improvements are explored. The research focuses on the southern Italian upholstery district of the Apulia region where world leading producers of leather sofas are located. The assessment of the environmental performance of the product showed a significant impact contribution from the manufacturing processes of polyurethane foam end leather, while the overall impact may be reduced focusing efforts on material selection and supply chain management. Therefore, new suppliers have been identified to evaluate the use of polyurethane and leather obtained with more environmentally friendly processes in future product design.