A bibliometric investigation of life cycle assessment research in the web of science databases

Purpose

Over the past few decades, life cycle assessment (LCA) methodologies have been developed extensively, and there has been a growing interest in LCA research. However, as attested by scientific literature, few systematic, synthesizing, and visualizing studies have been found on LCA research which show how this field has evolved over time. The goal of this mainly bibliometric, empirical study is to get insight into publication performance of global LCA research, characterize its intellectual structure, and trace its evolution by using the bibliometric method with visual mapping.

Methods

Based on the data from the ISI Web of Science databases Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-EXPANDED), Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), Conference Proceedings Citation Index—Science (CPCI-S) and Conference Proceedings Citation Index —Social Science & Humanities (CPCI-SSH) in the period of 1998–2013, bibliometric methods are used to investigate general development profiles of LCA research, while knowledge domain visualization technologies are employed to conduct a further co-citation analysis.

Results and discussion

The results and discussions of this research mainly shed light on (1) basic statistics of significant publication performances, (2) research focuses and their intellectual base in LCA research, (3) how the streams of research evolved during the whole period of interest.

Conclusions

A new work on systematic and synthesizing study is conducted in this research to evaluate and map LCA research-related context. Some salient scholarly journals and institutions are identified that have shown a significant impact during the exponential growth of LCA research in the past 16 years. Biofuel, process design, solid waste management, and livestock production-related LCA researches are the main areas where interest is surging, confirmed by the active citers in each specialty. Furthermore, from the perspective of science mapping, evolution of LCA research is traced and some pivot publications are identified, which work as structural holes for the LCA-research development in the given time window.