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Every product you work with begins as a raw material and follows a journey through extraction, processing, manufacturing, use, and eventually disposal or reuse. Understanding these material flows helps you see the full picture in your Målbar LCA screenings: where environmental impacts accumulate, and where design or sourcing decisions can make the most meaningful difference. Målbar provides ready-to-use flow diagrams for five major material categories so you can quickly build intuition for the materials in your own product portfolio.

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What are material flows?

Material flows map how a substance moves through its entire life cycle — from the point it is extracted from the ground or harvested, through every transformation and use, to the moment it is recycled, recovered, or discarded. Each stage consumes energy, generates emissions, and creates potential waste. By visualising these flows, you can pinpoint the stages that drive the largest share of a product’s climate footprint and identify opportunities to reduce it.
Material flow diagrams are especially useful when you are selecting between alternative materials or evaluating the impact of switching to recycled content. Compare the flows side by side to see where each material diverges.

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Available material flow diagrams

Download the full diagram pack or explore each material individually below. All diagrams are suitable for use in presentations, reports, and internal training.

Aluminium

Trace aluminium from bauxite mining through smelting, fabrication, product use, and end-of-life recycling. Aluminium’s high recycled-content potential makes the end-of-life stage particularly significant.

Ceramics

Follow ceramic materials from raw mineral extraction through firing and forming to disposal. Energy-intensive kiln processes make the production phase a key hotspot.

Electronics

Map the complex multi-material flows in electronic products, including rare earth elements, plastics, and metals, from mining through assembly, use, and e-waste processing.

Plastic

See how plastic travels from fossil fuel feedstocks through polymerisation, product manufacturing, and end-of-life — and how the virgin vs. recycled split affects the overall footprint.

Wood

Follow wood from forest management and harvesting through processing and product use to disposal or bioenergy recovery, including how carbon storage and release are accounted for.
These diagrams work well as teaching aids in internal sustainability training sessions. Use them to help colleagues who are new to LCA quickly understand why material choice matters and how end-of-life treatment affects the final footprint score in Målbar.

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Download the full pack

All five diagrams are available in a single download.

Download Material Processes diagram pack

Includes flow diagrams for Aluminium, Ceramics, Electronics, Plastic, and Wood in print-ready format.