Our work on LCA will for the time being focus on preparing environmental profiles of selected enzyme products comprising the production process from recovery of raw materials to the finished product leaving Novo Nordisk. More than 20 different raw materials and auxiliaries are used to produce enzymes, each with its own environmental profile. Often several suppliers of a given raw material are used, and supplies can be manufactured in different ways and have different environmental profiles. Each enzyme product is manufactured in several different formulations and is supplied in different packaging types and sizes. Experience from data collection so far shows that suppliers normally can only provide details of the environmental impacts of their own production, and not of the impacts of manufacturing the raw materials they use in production.
Some suppliers provide only very scant details to protect production secrets.
It is therefore often necessary to use data from accessible LCA literature and assessments of the environmental impact of similar processes to achieve a reasonably comprehensive picture of a raw material's environmental profile. In order to ensure that individual raw materials and thus the enzyme product's environmental profile are as correct as possible, in each case the data collected is subject to quality assessment. Determination of a standard and a procedure for preparation of environmental profiles for enzyme products. Selection and testing of a computer program to handle the LCA data. Since NovoLet was introduced in 1989 a recycling scheme has been established in Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland.