> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://learn.sustainly.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# How to Create a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) with Sustainly
> Step-by-step guide to creating your first LCA in Sustainly — from data setup to impact insights — in a workflow built for clarity, collaboration, and speed.
Creating a **Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)** used to involve heavy spreadsheets, weeks of manual modeling, and tools that required specialists to operate. Sustainly changes that.\
With guided workflows and transparent AI, you can build a complete, decision-ready LCA in a matter of minutes — whether you're a sustainability lead, product manager, designer, or simply new to the field.
This guide walks you through the entire process of building your first assessment in a way that is structured, intuitive, and scalable for future product iterations.
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## 🧭 Step 1: Set up your project
Start from the Sustainly dashboard and click **“New Project.”**\
Choose the type of assessment you want to run — from a quick product footprint to a more detailed lifecycle study.
Add a few essentials:
* Product name or variant
* Functional unit (what service or quantity the assessment is based on)
* System boundary (how far across the lifecycle you want to assess)
These three inputs shape the structure of your LCA and ensure your results remain consistent and comparable over time.
Sustainly guides you through the setup with prompts that help clarify scope and keep assumptions aligned across your team.
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## ⚙️ Step 2: Import or connect your data
Sustainly is built for teams that have data spread across multiple sources — from procurement sheets to manufacturing logs.
You can bring data in three simple ways:
1. **Manual entry** for quick prototyping
2. **Spreadsheet upload** using a clean, reusable template
3. **System connections** that let you pull data from internal tools without copying files around
Sustainly’s transparent AI identifies missing fields, inconsistent units, or unclear material names and suggests corrections — keeping your model clean and reliable.
Start with what you have. You can refine and enrich your data as your sustainability workflow matures.
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## 🧩 Step 3: Build your LCA model
Once your data is in place, Sustainly automatically structures the model for you.\
Instead of manually linking dozens of processes, you get a clear, editable flow of materials, energy, transport, and lifecycle stages.
Within the interface, you can:
* Review and adjust inputs
* Add manufacturing steps or additional transport routes
* Define use-phase behavior
* Explore circularity scenarios such as reuse or recycling
* Run sensitivities to understand how assumptions change the outcome
| Feature | Description |
| --------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------- |
| ⚡ Guided Modeling | AI structures your model and surfaces inconsistencies |
| 🧱 Transparent Flows | Every step is fully visible, editable, documented |
| 🌍 Scalable Structure | Reuse model logic across future products |
This accelerates the build phase and ensures that even non-experts can follow the logic behind the assessment.
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## 📊 Step 4: Review results and hotspots
Once you click **“Calculate,”** Sustainly generates full impact results and presents them in clear dashboards designed for quick interpretation.\
You can identify:
* Which materials drive the largest impacts
* Which lifecycle stage matters most
* How design changes affect the footprint
* Where circularity or supplier improvements offer the biggest gains
Learn how to read impact charts and spot improvement opportunities.
Explore how different design decisions shift your footprint.
Sustainly highlights the drivers behind each result, making the data easier to explain to teams, management, or customers.
***
## 🧾 Step 5: Generate reports and share insights
With one click, you can generate:
* Stakeholder-ready summary reports
* Deep-dive documentation for internal reviews
* Shareable dashboards for cross-team collaboration
Because Sustainly keeps assumptions, inputs, and boundaries organized, reports stay consistent — even when multiple team members work on the same project.
Reports are formatted using a transparent structure that makes verification and peer review easier.
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## 🌱 Bonus: Reuse and scale your model
Once you’ve built your first LCA, the real value comes from reusing your structure across product variants or new iterations.
Sustainly enables:
* **Cloning of existing projects**
* **Batch assessments** for large product families
* **Shared data libraries** to keep materials and assumptions consistent
* **Cross-team visibility** so product, engineering, and sustainability stay aligned
This creates a scalable sustainability workflow rather than a one-off analysis — ideal for businesses looking to grow their impact work without growing their workload.
A reusable model is one of the biggest time-savers. Build once, learn continuously.
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## ❓FAQ
**Do I need to be an LCA expert to use Sustainly?**\
No. The workflow is built for beginners and experts alike — transparent AI helps guide decisions while keeping methodology clear.
**Can multiple teams work on the same assessment?**\
Yes. Sustainly offers a shared company hub so teams can collaborate, review progress, and reuse data across departments.
**How precise does my data need to be to begin?**\
Your first assessment can start with estimates. Sustainly helps you refine accuracy over time with structured, centralized data.
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## 🌍 Conclusion
Creating an LCA should support better product decisions — not slow you down. Sustainly turns complexity into clarity with guided workflows, centralized sustainability data, and scalable processes that let your team work faster and smarter.
Start with a clear goal, bring your data in, and let Sustainly’s transparent AI help you build a model you can trust — in minutes, not days.
***