WRF Academy at WRF25: First Course on Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment
At the upcoming World Resources Forum 2025 in Geneva, a special training course on Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA) will be offered on site on Thursday, 4 September 2025 in Geneva.
With over a decade of experience in fostering dialogue, research, and collaboration on sustainable resource management, the World Resources Forum is proud to introduce the World Resources Forum Academy (WRFA). This initiative will offer tailored trainings on key topics related to the fair and sustainable use of natural resources—designed to equip professionals with practical tools and knowledge for real-world impact.
On the 4th September in the morning, right after the main conference in Geneva, the training course on Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA) with a specific focus on Social LCA will be offered by Prof. Sonia Valdivia and Prof. Guido Sonnemann.
Participants of WRF25 will get the exclusive opportunity to register for this training course free of charge. Please note that places are limited, and participation is not guaranteed. More details will be shared with ticket holders after registration.
Don’t miss your chance to be part of this WRFA training and strengthen your professional toolkit!
Course Programme:
Date & Time: Thursday, 4 September 2025, 9:00-12:30 at CCV, Geneva
- Megatrends, SDGs and ESG, life cycle thinking, role of stakeholders and underlying principles
- Introduction to ISO standards (14040/14044, 14075)
- Steps of environmental LCA
- Similarities and differences between social LCA and environmental LCA
- Stakeholders and social impact categories
- Objective, scope, functional unit, product utility and life cycle stages
- Type of impact assessment (performance assessment or impact pathway approach, impact categories by stakeholder group)
- Inventory: indicators, data collection (hotspots)
- Results visualization and interpretation: negative and positive impacts
- Introduction to life cycle costing indicators.
- Introduction to analysis of governance .
- Introduction to multi-criteria analysis.
Business case: discussion of results
A case study on safe and sustainable by design (SSbD) will be described by Akshat Sudheshwar (Empa: Swiss Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology)
The course aims to strengthen the capacity of actors from industry, government, and civil society to make informed decisions that promote sustainability throughout the life cycle of products.
Who should join?
- Decision-makers in sectors such as building, electronics, food, and healthcare
- Professionals verifying Environmental Product Declarations interested in Social Product Declarations
- LCA consultants seeking to expand their expertise to social and economic assessments
What can I expect to learn?
- How to conduct a social impact assessment across the product life cycle
- How to integrate environmental, social, and economic indicators into a single sustainability metric
- How to interpret and communicate sustainability assessment results to decision-makers
Instructors
Guido Sonnemann is full professor at the University of Bordeaux, where he heads The Life Cycle Group CyVi at the Institute of Molecular Sciences. The focus of his research is on Life Cycle Assessment for Sustainable Chemistry and Materials Sciences.
Until 2012 Guido Sonnemann was Sustainable Innovation Programme Officer and Science Focal Point for UNEP’s Resource Efficiency sub-programme, in which function he co-initiated the International Resource Panel.
He holds a PhD in chemical engineering, University Rovira & Virgili, Spain (2002), M.Sc. in environmental chemistry, University of Poitiers, France (1996), and graduated as environmental engineer, Technical University of Berlin (1995).
Instructors
Since 2014, Sonia is the Scientific Director of the World Resources Forum, where she is working in the areas of sustainable recycling industries and life cycle sustainability.
Since 2016, Sonia is an Honorary Professor at the Leuphana Universität Lüneburg, associated with the Faculty of Sustainability, Institute of Environmental and Sustainability Communication (INFU).
Sonia has worked for organisations such as UNITAR, NACEC (North American Center for Environmental Cooperation), INE (Mexican Institute of Ecology, as a GIZ coordinator of the Pan-American Network for Environmental Waste Management, as Program Officer of UNEP to coordinate the Secretariat of the UNEP/SETAC Life Cycle Initiative.
She has an academic background in Industrial Engineering, with a Ph.D. in Environmental Management and Policies from the Technical University of Karlsruhe (KIT).
Sona is the Co-Author of many important documents in the field, such as:
• UNEP Guidelines for Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment & Social Life Cycle Assessment
• Position Paper on Using Life Cycle Assessment to achieve a circular economy
Sharpen your Skills at WRF25
Join us on 2-3 September in Geneva and get the chance to participate in this WRF training on LCSA.