Healthcare Carbon Literacy Workshop and Life Cycle Analysis Masterclass

Climate change impacts health and well-being, yet the Australian healthcare sector is estimated to be the source of over 7% of Australia’s total carbon emissions. As health services are starting to reduce their carbon emissions, it is important that decision-makers and clinicians gain an understanding of how carbon footprints are determined from national to organisational to product level, as well as having the ability to critique the ever-increasing quantity of carbon footprints using life cycle assessment (LCA) being published in medical journals.

This in-person workshop and masterclass will involve detailed presentations and facilitated discussion by leading Australian experts in the field.

The program includes:

• A Healthcare Carbon Literacy Workshop (morning)
• Life Cycle Assessment Critique Masterclass (optional, to follow after lunch).

Program

Healthcare Carbon Literacy Workshop

When: 8:00 to 12:45
Where: Forum 1, Melbourne Connect, 700 Swanston St, The University of Melbourne, Carlton, VIC
Cost: $600 ($300 student, trainee and allied health rate) morning tea and lunch included
Register

Participants can expect to gain knowledge of:

• Healthcare carbon literacy and its importance
• The purpose and comparisons of different healthcare carbon footprint analysis methodologies
• In depth understanding of national, state (analysis of publications) and organisational (presentation of results) level healthcare carbon footprints
• Life cycle thinking
• An understanding of the critical components of a LCA
• Practical implications of clinical LCA.

Life Cycle Assessment Critique Master Class

Prerequisite: Participants are required to attend the morning session
When: 12:45 to 15:45
Where: Forum 1, Melbourne Connect, 700 Swanston St, The University of Melbourne, Carlton, VIC
Cost: $200 ($100 student, trainee and allied health rate) afternoon tea included
Register

Using the framework of ISO 14040 (Life cycle assessment – Principles and framework), we will be critiquing four published LCA papers from medical journals to determine what makes a high-quality paper.

Participants can expect to gain knowledge of:

• The importance of goal and scope, system boundary, and functional unit selection
• Data quality for life cycle inventories
• Integration of economic input-output data with process LCA data
• Sensitivity analysis
• Uncertainty analysis