agentic-lca

Use this skill when the user provides a URL to an LCA study, a published environmental report, or a product sustainability page and wants to turn it into a product_graph.yaml they can run and explore. Also triggers when the user names a well-known LCA study by title (e.g. "Cotton Inc. cotton fiber LCA", "IWTO wool LCA", "thredUP secondhand clothing study") and wants to recreate or remix it. Builds a base-case product graph plus 3–5 scenario variants (just like the Levi's jeans folder), then offers to run the analysis. Trigger phrases: "turn this into an LCA", "build a product graph from", "recreate this LCA", "make scenarios for", "use this study", "remix this LCA".

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of damage characterization — the step that goes beyond midpoint impact scores (kg CO2-eq, kg SO2-eq, PM 2.5-eq) to ask what those scores actually do to the world, in terms of three areas of protection: human health, ecosystem quality, and resource availability. Invoke as /damage-characterization followed by a case study name, for example /damage-characterization wool_yarn or /damage-characterization cotton_fiber. The skill reads the product graph and lca_results.md for that case study and reasons qualitatively about which midpoint scores feed into which damage area, using a leading-indicator-vs-revenue retail analogy. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background. Builds directly on the impact-characterization skill. Four to five exchanges to complete.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of functional unit — the precise definition of what is being measured in a life cycle study. Invoke as /functional-unit followed by a case study name, for example /functional-unit wool_yarn or /functional-unit polyester_tshirt. The skill reads the product graph for that case study and teaches the concept using real data, Socratic questions, and fashion or retail business context. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of goal and scope — the opening decisions in a life cycle study that define why it is being done, who it is for, and what is included or excluded. Invoke as /goal-and-scope followed by a case study name, for example /goal-and-scope wool_yarn or /goal-and-scope polyester_tshirt. The skill reads the product graph for that case study and teaches the concept using real data, Socratic questions, and fashion or retail business context. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of impact characterization — the exact maths behind life cycle impact assessment, where every emission in the inventory is multiplied by a characterization factor (a published number that can be different for every impact category) and then summed within each category. Invoke as /impact-characterization followed by a case study name, for example /impact-characterization wool_yarn or /impact-characterization cotton_fiber. The skill reads the product graph and lca_results.md for that case study and has students build the full characterization table themselves, by hand, using a shipping rate-card analogy and fashion or retail business context. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background. Builds directly on the what-is-impact-assessment skill — use that skill first if the student has not yet met characterization factors. Five to six exchanges to complete.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of life cycle inventory — the step where all emissions and resource uses from every process in the supply chain are collected, scaled to reflect one functional unit, and totalled into a single complete table. Invoke as /life-cycle-inventory followed by a case study name, for example /life-cycle-inventory wool_yarn or /life-cycle-inventory cotton_fiber. The skill reads the product graph for that case study and teaches the concept by walking through the inventory table step by step, using everyday analogies and fashion or retail business context. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background. Builds directly on the technosphere-and-ecosphere skill. Four to five exchanges to complete.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of life cycle stages — the four named boundary types used in fashion and retail LCA studies: cradle to gate, cradle to grave, cradle to cradle, and gate to grave. Invoke as /life-cycle-stages case-study, for example /life-cycle-stages wool_yarn or /life-cycle-stages polyester_tshirt. The skill reads the product graph for that case study and teaches the concept using real data, everyday analogies, and fashion or retail business context. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background. Builds directly on the system-boundary skill.

Use this skill whenever the user wants to perform a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) using openLCA. Triggers include: "carbon footprint of", "compare environmental impact", "LCA for", "which material has lower impact", "run an LCA", "ecoinvent dataset for", "GWP of", "calculate impact", "environmental footprint", "lifecycle analysis", "hotspot analysis", "sensitivity analysis", "scenario analysis", "cradle to gate". Also triggers when the user asks to make a spreadsheet, slides, or report FROM an LCA result.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of the scaling vector — how much each process in the supply chain must run to deliver exactly one functional unit. Invoke as /scaling-vector case-study, for example /scaling-vector wool_yarn or /scaling-vector polyester_tshirt. The skill reads the product graph and lca_results.md for that case study and walks the student through the calculation using plain division, not matrix algebra. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of supply chain and system boundary — how to read a product graph diagram, what each box (process) represents, what flows connect them, and what "upstream" and "downstream" mean. Invoke as /supply-chain followed by a case study name, for example /supply-chain wool_yarn or /supply-chain polyester_tshirt. The skill reads the product graph for that case study and walks the student through the supply chain diagram using real data and Socratic questions. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of system boundary — the fence drawn around a study that decides what is counted and what is ignored. Invoke as /system-boundary case-study, for example /system-boundary wool_yarn or /system-boundary cotton_fiber. The skill reads the product graph for that case study and teaches the concept using everyday analogies, the supply chain diagram, and fashion or retail business context. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background. Short and visual — four to five exchanges to complete.

Teaching skill for the LCA concepts of technosphere and ecosphere — the two worlds that every LCA study maps: the human-made world of factories, farms, and supply chains (technosphere) and the natural world of air, water, and soil (ecosphere). Invoke as /technosphere-and-ecosphere followed by a case study name, for example /technosphere-and-ecosphere wool_yarn or /technosphere-and-ecosphere polyester_tshirt. The skill reads the product graph for that case study and teaches the concept by sorting its parts into the two worlds, using everyday analogies and fashion or retail business context. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background. Short and visual — four to five exchanges to complete.

Teaching skill for the LCA concept of life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) — the step that converts the raw inventory of emissions and resource use (kg of CO2, kg of methane, kg of ammonia, litres of water) into a small set of comparable impact category scores, using conversion numbers called characterization factors. Invoke as /what-is-impact-assessment followed by a case study name, for example /what-is-impact-assessment wool_yarn or /what-is-impact-assessment cotton_fiber. The skill reads the product graph and lca_results.md for that case study and teaches the concept using a currency-exchange analogy and fashion or retail business context. Designed for FIT students with no science or coding background. Builds directly on the life-cycle-inventory skill. Four to five exchanges to complete.

Orientation skill for Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) — what it is, why fashion and retail professionals need it, and how a study is structured. Invoke as /what-is-lca with no argument needed. Designed as the very first skill a student encounters before any other LCA concept. Uses everyday analogies, Socratic questions, and fashion and retail business context. No science or coding background assumed.