MARGIN: Marginal Analysis of Regional Growth and International Networks

MARGIN is a personal research project developed to explore and advance the application of marginal analysis within consequential life cycle assessment (LCA). The project combines international production statistics, trade networks, and market trend analysis to identify potential marginal suppliers across regions and product systems.

The work was motivated by a long-standing interest in consequential LCA and the challenge of making market-based assessments more transparent, reproducible, and data-driven. By compiling and processing more than 2.000 datasets, MARGIN provides an open framework for investigating market dynamics and supporting consequential modelling.

While developed independently as a personal project, the ambition is to contribute to the broader discussion on market modelling, future supplier identification, and methodological development within consequential LCA. The project is shared openly to encourage discussion, critique, and further development by researchers and practitioners interested in market-based environmental assessment.

The dataset and associated code are available through Zenodo.

Find the project here

On a personal level, consequential LCA has always fascinated me because it attempts to answer not only what exists today, but what actually changes as a consequence of decisions. MARGIN emerged from a desire to better understand and operationalize that perspective using openly available data and transparent methods. The project represents both a technical exercise and an exploration of one of the most interesting methodological questions in LCA: how we identify the actors that respond to changes in demand. I hope the work can serve as a useful resource and inspire further discussion and development within the consequential LCA community.