Admission requirements
This course is obligatory for students of the MSc Industrial Ecology (joint degree TU Delft and Leiden University).
Description
The course introduces the key analytical tools used in the field of Industrial Ecology (IE), providing an understanding of their underlying philosophy and their position in the field. Students are trained in the applicability of these tools by working on case studies with the aid of specific software-tools.
Before the course begins, please ensure that you can run the software-tools STAN (https://www.stan2web.net/) and OpenLCA (https://www.openlca.org/) on your computer. For Apple users, please ensure you can run MS windows. For guidance on this, you may refer to resources such as: www.howtogeek.com/187359/5-ways-to-run-windows-software-on-a-mac.
Course objectives
Upon successful completion of this course, you will have the ability to:
DESCRIBE the most important analytical tools in IE, their philosophy and position in the field.
DISCUSS the applicability of these tools, including their potential uses and limitations).
DEFINE and refine research questions for your analysis.
UTILIZE 3 families of analytical tools (including the associated software & databases), namely: Material Flow Analysis/Substance Flow Analysis (MFA/SFA), Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), Environmental Extended Input Output Analysis (EEIOA) for pre-processed cases in a societal, policy, or business contexts.
PRESENT your findings in a clear and transparent manner.
DEMONSTRATE analytical, critical and system’s thinking skills.
Timetable
In MyTimetable, you can find all course and programme schedules, allowing you to create your personal timetable. Activities for which you have enrolled via MyStudyMap will automatically appear in your timetable.
Additionally, you can easily link MyTimetable to a calendar app on your phone, and schedule changes will be automatically updated in your calendar. You can also choose to receive email notifications about schedule changes. You can enable notifications in Settings after logging in.
Questions? Watch the video, read the instructions, or contact the ISSC helpdesk.
Note: Joint Degree students from Leiden/Delft need to combine information from both the Leiden and Delft MyTimetables to see a complete schedule. This video explains how to do it.
Mode of instruction
Lectures and discussions with key articles for theoretical background.
Practical group work with software tools for MFA/SFA, LCA and EEIOA skills.
Consultation offered for each group work session.
Course materials are communicated at Brightspace Leiden University.
Assessment method
Assessment
Individual written exam (5,5 out of 10 points). A 3-hour digital exam will be conducted on campus at the end of the course. The examination will consist of a combination of close-ended questions (e.g. multiple choice) and short open-ended questions.
Group assignments (4,5 out of 10 points). Throughout the course, there will be three group assignments focusing on SFA, LCA and EEIOA. Each assignment contributes 1.5 points to the total score, which is determined by the quality of group reports and the accompanying models. Additionally, each assignment has two mandatory work sessions. Please note that absence from these work sessions could result in a reduction of up to 10% in the individual score for each assignment.
Weighing
The final grade for the course is determined by the weighted average of the written exam score (55%) and the group assignment score (45%).
The final grade is expressed as a number between 1 and 10, rounded to the nearest half. The rounding process is only applied at the end for the final calculation. Interim grades (for the written exam and group assignments) will retain two decimal places. Please note that a grade of 5,5 cannot be awarded. Grades ranging from 5,01 to 5,49 are rounded down to 5,0, while grades between 5,50 and 5,99 are rounded up to 6,0.
Resit
A resit is offerred for the individual written exam.To pass the course, the minimum unrounded grade for both the written exam and the overall course must reach 5.50.
In case of an insufficient grade, a resit is offered for the individual written exam.
Inspection and feedback
A inspection and feedback session is offered within 3 weeks from the publication of the grading results of the written exam.
Reading list
Jan J. Boersema and Lucas Reijnders (eds). Principles of Environmental Sciences, ISBN 978-1-4020-9157-5. Key chapters used in the course are:
Helias Udo de Haes and Reinout Heijungs, Chapter 12.4 Material Flow Analysis: A Tool for Analysing the Metabolism of Materials and Substances
Helias Udo de Haes and Reinout Heijungs, Chapter 12.5 Life Cycle Assessment: A tool for the Analysis of Product Systems
Reinout Heijungs, Chapter 17A An illustration of the LCA technique
Paul Ekins, Chapter 11.2 Input-Output Analysis
Registration
As a student, you are responsible for enrolling on time through MyStudyMap.
In this short video, you can see step-by-step how to enrol for courses in MyStudyMap.
Extensive information about the operation of MyStudyMap can be found here.
There are two enrolment periods per year:
Enrolment for the fall opens in July
Enrolment for the spring opens in December
See this page for more information about deadlines and enrolling for courses and exams.
Note:
It is mandatory to enrol for all activities of a course that you are going to follow.
Your enrolment is only complete when you submit your course planning in the ‘Ready for enrolment’ tab by clicking ‘Send’.
Not being enrolled for an exam/resit means that you are not allowed to participate in the exam/resit.
Contact
Coordinator(s): Dr.ing. N. Thonemann and prof. René Kleijn
Other involved teachers: Ranran Wang, Lauran van Oers, Ingeborg Kluts, Reinout Hijungs and Stefano Cucurachi
Remarks
MSc Industrial Ecology students can register for the course and exam via MystudyMap. Other students need to contact the study advisors of the programme via studyadvisor-ie@cml.leidenuniv.nl
Software
Starting from the 2024/2025 academic year, the Faculty of Science will use the software distribution platform Academic Software. Through this platform, you can access the software needed for specific courses in your studies. For some software, your laptop must meet certain system requirements, which will be specified with the software. It is important to install the software before the start of the course. More information about the laptop requirements can be found on the student website.