In the production stage, the environmental costs of the manufacturing of the packaging are taken into account.
Calculation method
The environmental cost are calculated by multiplying the amount of energy used for the production process by the energy mix of the country where the production process takes place. Since the energy mix (gas/coal/green) of an electricity grid of a country can vary factor 30 between countries we always ask for the location of the production process.
Waste from the production process
If the waste is not specified by the supplier, we take 10% for each raw material used, which is already added to the eco-costs of the raw material stage.
We assume that the waste will be recycled and is therefore not included in the end-of-life footprint calculations. The reason for this is that the individual material that is used for the product often consists of mono-materials that are easily recycled.
Suggestions based on packaging category
For most packaging, the manufacturing process is well known. Therefore, the Pickler tool helps the user by making suggestions for the product category. The suggestions are there to increase the usability but should still be checked by the user and if necessary, adapted.
Out of scope
Please read here which data is out of scope for the production process.