Life-Cycle Cost Analysis of Infrastructure Projects - Governing the Nexus: Water, Soil and Waste Resources Considering Global Change - page 109

analysis (13 %) and very few studies have taken all the phases of life cycle into
account while making the assessments (Korpi and Ala-Risku 2008 ). However, this
trend has changed since the beginning of this century. As observed above, adoption
of LCCA has spread beyond manufacturing covering service sector as well as
natural resources. These include water and other natural resources (Koehler 2008 ;
Batchelor et al. 2011 ; Koroneos et al. 2013 ); crops (Iraldo et al. 2014 ; Gathorne-
Hardy 2013b ) and biofuels (Davis et al. 2008 ). Of late LCCA is found effective in
service sectors like water and sanitation (WASHCost 2010 ; Jones et al. 2012 ).
Most of these studies have been framed in narrow life cycle boundaries thus
limiting the potential for achieving sustainable development/green economy goals.
There is need for enhancing intensity as well as scale of the LCCA adoption. This
calls for policy changes making the adoption of LCCA mandatory at various levels
and providing guidelines for achieving green economy objectives. For example, life
cycle thinking is an important element of European environmental policy. A new
law in Switzerland requires a complete LCCA of biofuels in order to quantify the
fuel tax to be paid (Korpi and Ala-Risku 2008 ). Adopting life cycle thinking in all
countries, especially in the developing countries where environmental protections
as well as service delivery are of low priority, is important for achieving cost
effective sustainable development. Awareness and capacity building for adopting
LCCA methods and tools is a critical step in that direction.

3 LCCA: Framework and Concepts

As discussed, LCCA has evolved from a project appraisal tool to a more com-
prehensive method of incorporating sustainable development aspects in various
sectors. LCCA could be conceived in the broader sustainable development
framework. The framework consists of three inter-connected sustainability
dimensions (economic, environmental, social). Economic sustainability concept
draws from the public financial and economic assessment

of investments. Environmental sustainability is based on externalities framework
(again from public good and public

finance framework using

finance). Social sustainability draws from
public policy framework where service delivery, governance and social equity are
critical. Achieving sustainability on these three counts is a challenge. The nexus
approach of water, energy and food security (Hoff 2011 ) comes close to addressing
this challenge. The nexus approach provides a broader framework within which
granularity exists. Here granularity is referred to the linkages within the sector and
sub-sectors. For instance, within water sector, the linkages between surface and
groundwater resources, between irrigation and drinking water. Similarly, within
drinking water the linkages between water, sanitation, wastewater, reuse of
wastewater, etc., are very much interlinked organically. The granularity is well
captured in the three overarching questions raised by Kurian and Ardakanian
( 2013 ), (1) intersectionality (critical mass of factors at the intersection of material