Life cycle sustainability assessment: An ongoing journey

As the call for sustainable solutions at operational, industrial, and policy level increases, the need for a comprehensive assessment tool has been addressed by literature and practitioners. In particular, for the definition of a complete framework, the application of a life cycle thinking lens is required to explore the longitudinal dimension of the impacts and possible indirect effects triggered on environmental, social, and economic levels. The definition of an integrated life cycle sustainability assessment framework is currently an ongoing journey, which is summarized in the present chapters. The narrative follows a set of milestones, namely the definition of the concept and the preliminary scheme in the early years, the pathway towards the implementation of a standardized set of tools, an anthology of significant case studies in different sectors, and an overview of the challenges identified by literature and yet remaining open for future researches.