Life Cycle Assessment of material substitution in manufacturing equipment by wood-based structures in the automotive industry

The international focus on climate protection and resource efficiency has led to increased research into renewable raw materials in numerous industrial sectors as a sustainable alternative to conventional materials. The use of bio-based materials is also becoming increasingly relevant in the field of automotive logistics and factory equipment, particularly against the backdrop of global sustainability strategies pursued by automotive manufacturers. Although initial studies have demonstrated environmental advantages, there is still no consistent assessment approach that takes into account the specific requirements of car body construction systems and systematically maps the influence of bound biogenic carbon. Life cycle analyses use different calculation methods to evaluate the environmental impact of using bio-based materials in the context of bound biogenic carbon. This article closes this research gap by presenting a specific approach to the environmental assessment of car body construction systems using renewable raw materials. This approach can be applied across industries to factory equipment. The aim is to quantify the environmental effectiveness of material substitution in an industrial environment in a transparent and reliable manner using the presented accounting approach, based on a case study of a car body construction plant. The study goes beyond the technical and economic dimensions and focuses on the assessment of environmental sustainability. The results of the case study show that the use of renewable raw materials is an effective method of reducing environmental impact and that the proposed assessment approach has proven to be feasible. The treatment of biogenic carbon in the assessment has a significant influence on the result. To supplement the findings, a potential analysis based on a reference car body construction was conducted to further illustrate the potential of material substitution.