LCAQuick: Life cycle assessment tool

About this tool

LCAQuick is a free tool developed by BRANZ that helps architects, designers and structural engineers make sustainable design decisions. It evaluates the carbon footprint and other environmental impacts of a building design. It can be used by anyone with an interest to understand the environmental impacts of buildings across the life cycle.

What can LCAQuick help you do?

LCAQuick allows you to:

• Carry out a whole‑building life cycle assessment (LCA)
• Understand both embodied carbon (materials and construction) and operational impacts (energy and water use)
• Compare different design options and construction methods
• Identify which materials contribute most to environmental impacts
• Check how a design performs against an allowable building carbon budget

These features help teams make informed choices earlier in the design process, when changes are easiest and most effective. 

What building types are supported?

The tool includes a library of reference buildings to support early‑stage design, including:

• Commercial office buildings
• Houses, medium‑density housing and apartments
• School buildings

Each building type is available across different New Zealand climate zones, making results more relevant to your project location. 

Carbon budgets and zero‑carbon goals

LCAQuick lets you compare your design against a building carbon budget developed by BRANZ and Massey University. These budgets reflect New Zealand’s climate targets and align with limiting global warming to 1.5°C. Carbon budgets are currently available for residential and office buildings. 

Using the LCAQuick tool

LCAQuick is built in Microsoft Excel and works alongside common BIM tools. You can:

• Enter material quantities manually, paste them in, or load saved files
• Use outputs from energy and water simulations, or rely on default values provided
• Generate results that align with Green Star and Ministry of Education reporting requirements

The full version - LCAQuick V3.6

This is the full working version of LCAQuick V3.6, which calculates environmental impacts based on the data you enter.It is best to use it on a reasonably powerful computer. Due to the size of the file and the numbers of calculations that are performed, it can be slower. Please ensure that you are using Microsoft Excel from 2016 or later.

If you wish, you can use LCAQuickV3.6 Data Entry initially to sort and enter your data.

Lighter data entry version - LCAQuickV3.6 Data Entry

This is a lighter version of LCAQuick that allows you to sort and format your data correctly but does not contain the functionality to calculate environmental impacts.

Once your data is in the correct format, you can copy and paste it into the full version of LCAQuickV3.6, which will then calculate the environmental impacts. Please ensure that you are using Microsoft Excel from 2016 or later.

Training, support and feedback

BRANZ offers free training and support to help users get the most from LCAQuick. You can access:

• Training videos
• Step‑by‑step BIM guidance
• A LinkedIn discussion group for questions and shared learning

Users are also encouraged to provide feedback to help improve the tool over time. 

Important to know

LCAQuick is a guidance tool and is provided free to use. Results should be used to inform design decisions, alongside professional judgement and project‑specific information.