16. Glossary

Énergie d'exploitation; operational energy

Some objects, like a refrigerator or a car, consume energy when they are used: electricity for a refrigerator, gasoline or diesel for a car with an internal combustion engine. For the user, this is the energy needed to use the object throughout its lifetime. This is also referred to as the object's direct or usage energy.

Grey energy

The manufacture of an object, its maintenance and the management of its end-of-life also require a quantity of energy that is rarely taken into account, as it is the responsibility of external economic agents such as the manufacturer, transporters, repairers or waste managers. This is known as hidden energy.

Life cycle analysis (LCA); Analyse du cycle de vie (ACV)

Applied to energy systems, the...