About

Why we built it

Every inventory database names its substances differently, and nothing in those names says whether two entries mean the same thing. We built this list so that a flow in one database can be translated to its counterpart in another, with every step of the translation open to inspection. Why this exists

Who builds it

Brightway Labs builds and maintains this list and publishes it openly. The company was co-founded by Chris Mutel, who created and maintains Brightway, the open-source LCA framework.

We are also the team behind Brightway Cloud, a collaborative tool for LCA that uses this list.

brightway-lca.com ↗

Maintainer

• Chris Mutel Scientist · Brightway Labs

How decisions are made

Every flow and every factor records which source asserted it and which step decided it, so any decision can be checked against its evidence. How a flow is decided

Decisions on the Brightway Flows list are currently made by the maintainers, working with experienced life cycle impact assessment experts and scientists. Our goal is to develop a more formal and inclusive governance structure over time.

Contribute or report a problem

If a flow is matched to the wrong substance, published under the wrong name, filed in the wrong compartment or given a factor that cannot be its own, tell us. Every flow and substance page has links that open a pre-filled issue, and you do not need to run a build or clone anything: name the row and say what your evidence is, and the measurement is done for you.

The list also has questions of its own waiting on a person — one registry number claimed by two names, a rename awaiting a ruling. Those are at the queues, and answering one takes a verdict and a paragraph saying why.

Licence and reuse

Data

ODbL-1.0

Code

AGPL-3.0-or-later

Source-list content

Every source list this one is built from is either in the public domain -- the GLAD mapping files, which is how the ecoinvent and SimaPro names reach this list -- or published under the same Open Database Licence this list uses, as ecoinvent's glossary is. No field here carries terms stricter than ODbL-1.0.

Contact and legal notice

Privacy

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