3. EIME methodology fundamentals

3.1 Product description

A life-cycle analysis enables us to measure environmental impacts by precisely identifying all the flows generated, stage by stage. This analysis can be very costly, given the amount of information that needs to be collected at each stage.

The EIME method is based on modeling a product using elementary building blocks, known as generic modules, classified in the database. A distinction is made (figure 5 ):

• functional sub-assemblies known as "components", whose environmental impact can be calculated independently, as a first approximation and in relation to the overall impact of the product in which...