The ability to provide adequate nutrition is considered a key factor in evaluating the sustainability of foods and diets. Nutrient indices are used as functional units (FU) in life cycle assessment of foods to include nutritional performance in the environmental assessment of a product. Several general and food-group-specific nutrient indices exist but many lack validation, particularly when used as FU. In addition, the nutrient selection strategies and reference units for nutrient intake can vary considerably among studies. To validate intake-based product-group-specific nutrient indices previously developed for protein (NR-FIprot) and carbohydrate (NR-FIcarb) foods and for fruits and vegetables (NR-FIveg), we applied principal component analysis to investigate correlations between nutrients in foods and dishes representing a typical Finnish diet. The reference amounts for meal components were based on a plate model that reflected Finnish dietary recommendations. The portion sizes for the different food groups were anchored at 100 g, 135 g and 350 g for proteins, carbohydrates and fruits/vegetables, respectively. Statistical modelling largely validated the NR-FI indices, highlighting protein foods as sources of niacin, vitamin B12 and Se, carbohydrate foods as sources of Mg, Fe and phosphorous, and fruits/vegetables as sources of potassium, vitamin K, vitamin C, fibre and thiamine. However, in contrast to the intake-based approach applied in NR-FIprot, the dietary recommendation-based validation process suggested that fruits and vegetables should be favoured as sources of riboflavin and vitamin B6.

The Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) has been established over the last few years as a new control variable in product design to quantify the sustainable impact of a product. However, the calculation of the PCF is subject to numerous uncertainties and assumptions, which are no longer represented in the stand-alone value. The uncertainties and assumptions arise at different stages of the calculation of the PCF and consequently create a multidimensional problem, which means that the PCF does not provide a trustworthy basis for comparing different production scenarios. To face this multidimensional issue, in this paper, a methodology for categorization of the different issues and, therefore, of the final PCF is presented. Through this methodology, which is divided into five levels mainly based on the origin, the quality, and the uncertainty of the data, an assessment can be made as to whether the values of the PCFs are comparable in different scenarios. The methodology can therefore help to improve decisions in product development with regard to environmental sustainability.

In this paper, I demonstrate that a well-known left-right asymmetry, Biberauer, Holmberg and Roberts’s (2014) Final-over-Final Condition (FOFC), which these authors claim follows from Kayne’s Linear Correspondence Axiom (LCA), is actually better explained under a symmetric approach to syntactic structure building in tandem with the mechanism that underlies the constraints on rightward movement. Apart from circumventing the theoretical and empirical problems that this LCA-based analysis faces, the fact that particles form a natural class of counterexamples to FOFC naturally follows under such a symmetric approach. The final part of this paper shows that this explanation to FOFC also straightforwardly applies to the semi-universal leftwardness of (subject) specifiers in both head-final and head-initial languages.

This paper examines the possibility of embedding public long-term care (LTC) insurance within the retirement pension system, i.e. introducing life care annuities into a notional defined contribution framework. To do this, we develop a multistate overlapping generations model that includes the so-called survivor dividend and give special attention to the assumptions made about mortality rates for dependent persons and LTC incidence rates, which largely determine the contribution rate assigned to LTC. The proposed model could be of interest to policymakers because it could be implemented without too much difficulty, it would universalize LTC coverage with a “fixed” cost, and it would discourage politicians from making promises about future LTC benefits without the necessary funding support.

Since sustainability and environmental issues rose lately, lightweighting has been the point of interest for automotive and aerospace sectors. Lightweighting reduces the fuel consumption of the vehicles and as a result of this reduces emissions. Aluminum, especially wrought aluminum alloys, have large potentials for dramatic weight reduction of structural parts while maintaining the safety and performance. Wrought aluminum alloys are used in automotive skin, bumpers and suspension parts etc. Lightweight suspension parts improve the ride quality and handling, additional to fuel consumption and emission reduction. Holistic life cycle approach takes into account the material flows and related information flows in order to achieve these material flows through the life cycle of the components as well as performance characteristics not only in technical and economic terms but also environmental and social terms. It is necessary to have seamless information flow through the life cycle of the components that could be enabled by the closed-loop product life cycle management (PLM). Closed-loop PLM may also help collection of life cycle information which is necessary to generate performance characteristics and distribution of performance characteristics among life cycle actors.

What environmental constraints will materials have to face in the future? Can currentmeasurement tools like LCA (Life Cycle Analysis) support the choices of material and adaptto these constraints to pave the way to a sustainable world? Are there some alternative orcomplementary approaches to enhance the quality of information for decision makers? Theaim of this article is to provide answers to these three questions. The society oftomorrow, in the second half of the 21st century, will be a society where the circulareconomy will play a more important role and thus will help reduce materials waste. This isa critical aspect of sustainability. To get there, the decisions have to be enlightenedand fair, because the decisions (or non-decisions) made today shape the world that futuregenerations will have to manage. Furthermore, Lord Kelvin used to say: “what you can’tmeasure, you can’t improve”. Therefore, these decisions have to be supported bymeasurement tools that will properly capture the stakes of reuse and recycling at the endof life of products. Today, LCA is the common tool used to address this matter. However,the present article has shown that LCA cannot incorporate the whole complexity ofsustainability. LCA is good at considering micro-scale issues, comparing one solution withanother, in a static approach. How can it give right directions to decision makers inorder to support the vision of a circular economy? The application of different standardsshowed that it is not easy at all and that recycling product at their end of life are notrewarded equally and sometimes not promoted at all. Therefore rebound effects leading tocontradictory decisions may occur. LCA alone is not enough to make enlightened decisions.It should be complemented by other methods. This was proposed in the last part. Based onthe IPAT equation, this approach tries to capture different aspects that are not addressedproperly by LCA, due to the fact that the functional unit is too restrictive, that thetime dimension and prospective approach should be more integrated, and that it shouldenlarge the scale of the analysis to the macro-economy and the socio-economy. It shouldalso recognize that the efforts have to be shared by different players including materialindustry and manufacturers, policy makers and society in general. As a general conclusion,we are convinced that tomorrow’s society will recognize the value of materials that arerecyclable and reusable, like steel has been for many decades. But there is still a clearneed to addressing, in research and development, the improvement of the metrics, combiningsocial, environmental and economic assessment, so that the sustainability value ofmaterials is properly measured. These are the objectives of the Sovamat Initiative and theSAM conferences.

In this presentation, the development of a simulation model that can examine thelong-term strategy of materials industries, called a material strategy model, is proposed.This model has the following structure: first, the world is divided into a number of areasand a scenario for the demand for end products in the future in each area is provided.Then, the system required to realize the scenario and to minimize CO2 emissionor the total cost is calculated using this model. In other words, the optimization toselect processes in society to minimize total CO2 emission or total cost iscarried out. As a result, the possibility of the long-term scenario; for example, theamount of car production based on population increase and GDP growth, can be discussed byconsidering CO2 emission and consumption of resources. A few simulation modelsto discuss long-term strategy have been developed in the field of energy system studies.In the energy system model, only a few resources such as coal, oil, natural gas anduranium are considered, but, in the material strategy model, it is necessary to examinemany materials and resources. In addition, the material strategy model should have anenergy model as one part of the model. As a first step, a prototype model mainly focusingon iron and steel with their alloys should be developed to show the capability to developthe whole model.

Materials have been central to the development of civilization, as they constitute thebackbone of our society and of our technology, as all things are made of materials and allof them are made by tools mainly made of metals, and especially iron and steel. In modernlanguage, they have become central to the sustainability of our society. Speaking about ormeasuring this relationship, however, is complex. Life Cycle Thinking is an important toolfor doing this, but it was not developed with materials in mind and it focuses only onthat small part of sustainability related to environmental impacts. Economic and societalissues require other methodologies and all these complementary visions have to beaggregated in order to report properly on sustainability matters. To advance towards sucha new tool, called the New Metrics, an Initiative called SOVAMAT was launched 10 years agoand a Community has shaped up, binging together academics from a broad array of hard andsoft disciplines, materials producers from metals to plastics, glass, paper/cardboard,concrete, carbons, wood, etc., and materials users, including meta-users who work onecodesign, for example. The agenda of the Initiative is moving forward, improving existingmethodology, extending it and aggregating various tools towards the final target of theNew Metrics. The SOVAMAT Community meets regularly in annual seminars called Society andMaterials or SAM. This paper explains the questions addressed by the Initiative and someof its early successes.