title: A multidimensional environmental evaluation of packaging materials.
abstract: To reduce environmental damage, the properties of environmental issues must be understood. Most previous research has performed relevant assessment either qualitatively or quantitatively. This paper provides a new comprehensive evaluative framework to integrate these two types of approaches. Three methods are combined: (1) life cycle assessment (LCA), a quantitative method, to assess environmental loading, (2) analytic hierarchy process (AHP), a qualitative method, to obtain opinions from experts, and (3) cluster analysis to integrate the results of the former two methods. This new framework could provide integrated information and avoid a bias towards either qualitative or quantitative approach. To present the process of this new evaluative framework, packaging materials are selected as the case study in this paper.
authors.affiliation: Graduate Institute of Environmental Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC. F87541201@ms87.ntu.edu.tw
authors.forename: Chien-Chung
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: Hwong-Wen
authors.initials: HW
authors.lastname: Ma
mesh_terms: D001628:Beverages; D016000:Cluster Analysis; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources; D004785:Environmental Pollutants / Q000032:analysis* / Q000633:toxicity; D008422:Materials Testing; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D019064:Product Packaging; D012037:Refuse Disposal; D018570:Risk Assessment
chemical_list: D004785:Environmental Pollutants