LCA of comprehensive pig manure management incorporating integrated technology systems

Increased and intensified pig production has raised the needs for proper management systems of pig manure in order to reduce negative environmental impacts. The objectives of this study were to identify the most significant environmental impacts from pig manure management considering a wide range of impact categories and to determine which integrated technology system at which handling stage can achieve the highest impact reduction. Twelve scenarios applying various treatment, storage and land application systems were developed and compared. Life cycle assessment (LCA) with the aim of capturing the actual consequences of the considered scenarios was selected as the tool for impact quantification. The most important impact categories in this investigation are global warming (GWP), aquatic eutrophication (AEP), respiratory inorganics (RIP), and terrestrial eutrophication (TEP). The two latter impacts, caused by ammonia emissions, have not been widely considered in most of previous LCA studies on pig manure management. The main keys for the effective impact reduction are the integration of treatment technology systems aiming at energy recovery with high nutrient recovery and control of greenhouse gas, ammonia, and nitrate emissions at every handling stage. For GWP and AEP, the anaerobic digestion-based scenario with natural crust storage achieves the highest impact reduction because of high efficiencies in energy and nutrient recovery with restricted emissions of GHG and nitrate. For RIP and TEP, the incineration and thermal gasification based scenarios and the scenario without a treatment system applying the deep injection method yield the highest impact minimisation due to the lowest ammonia emissions. This study further indicates the need to consider all significant impacts to decide the best management options taking into consideration local conditions.     

Life cycle assessment of ACQ-treated lumber with comparison to wood plastic composite decking

A cradle-to-grave life cycle assessment was done to identify the environmental impacts related to alkaline copper quaternary (ACQ)-treated lumber used for decking and to determine how the impacts compare to the primary alternative product, wood plastic composite (WPC) decking. A model of ACQ-treated lumber life cycle stages was created and used to calculate inputs and outputs during the lumber production, treating, use, and disposal stages. Lumber production data are based on published sources. Primary wood preservative treatment data were obtained by surveying wood treatment facilities in the United States. Product use and disposal inventory data are based on published data and professional judgment. Life cycle inventory inputs, outputs, and impact indicators for ACQ-treated lumber were quantified using functional units of 1000 board feet and per representative deck (assumed to be 320 square feet (30 square meters) of surface decking material) per year of use. In a similar manner, an inventory model was developed for the manufacture, use, and disposal of the primary alternative product, WPC. Impact indicator values, including greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, fossil fuel use, water use, acidification, smog forming potential, ecological toxicity, and eutrophication were quantified for each of the two decking products. National normalization was done to compare the significance of a representative deck surface per year of use to a family’s total annual impact footprint.If an average U.S. family adds or replaces a deck surfaced with ACQ-treated lumber, their impact “footprint” for GHG emissions, fossil fuel use, acidification, smog forming potential, ecological toxicity, and eutrophication releases each is less than one-tenth of a percent of the family’s annual impact. ACQ-treated lumber impacts were fourteen times less for fossil fuel use, almost three times less for GHG emissions, potential smog emissions, and water use, four times less for acidification, and almost half for ecological toxicity than those for WPC decking. Impacts were approximately equal for eutrophication.     

Global environmental consequences of increased biodiesel consumption in Switzerland: consequential life cycle assessment

This study assesses the direct and indirect environmental impacts to be expected if Switzerland should replace one percent of its current diesel consumption with imports of A) soybean methyl ester (SME) from Brazil, or B) palm methyl ester (PME) from Malaysia. In order to take into account possible future consequences, what-if scenarios were developed and assessed by means of a consequential LCA. In contrast to attributional LCA, the consequential approach uses system enlargement to include the marginal products affected by a change of the physical flows in the central life cycle. This means that the LCA considers all inputs and outputs which are linked to biodiesel production and that the product system is subsequently expanded to include the marginal products affected. Both future systems are assessed in comparison with the environmental scores of the fossil equivalent to biodiesel, i.e. diesel low in sulphur. The environmental burdens are measured by means of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), land occupation and various non-aggregated and aggregated environmental impact indicators.In sum, the environmental impacts of an increased SME consumption depend on the environmental scores of the marginal replacement products on the world market, rather than on local production factors. In other words, the marginal products assumed to be affected are most important for the results obtained, i.e. in particular the marginal vegetable oil, fodder cake and land areas. In this study it is SME production increased at the expense of the available soybean oil which shifts the impacts associated with soybean oil production to the production of the marginal vegetable oils on the world market. In this perspective, it is not relevant in which country biodiesel production takes place, but rather which vegetable oil is involved. With respect to PME, the most relevant determining factor for the environmental impacts is the land area affected by the increased cultivation of oil palms. Currently, this expansion displaces primarily peat land and rain forest. This causes GHG emissions which are much higher than the emissions of the fossil reference. All in all, both PME from Malaysia and SME from Brazil cause more environmental impact than allowed by the Swiss tax redemption on agro-biofuels (max. 60% GHG emissions and 125% UBP of the fossil reference).     

Assessing the environmental impact of metal production processes

Evaluating both new and existing processes for primary metal production to assess their environmental impacts is often difficult due to the many inputs and outputs involved. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a methodology that can be used for such purposes to identify those parts of the metal production life cycle that have significant environmental impacts. LCA has been used by CSIRO Minerals to assess the “cradle-to-gate” environmental impacts of a number of metal production processes practised either currently or potentially in Australia. The metals considered included copper, nickel, aluminium, lead, zinc, steel, stainless steel and titanium, by both pyrometallurgical and hydrometallurgical routes in some instances. The environmental profile included greenhouse and acid rain gas emissions, solid waste emissions and gross energy consumption. The results for various metals are compared in this paper. New process technologies for primary metal production can be expected to reduce the environmental impacts of metal production, and estimates of likely reductions for technologies involving stainless steel, titanium and aluminium are also presented in this paper.     

Effects of waste recovery on carbon footprint: a case study of the Gulf of Bothnia steel and zinc industries

This article analyses the impact of waste recovery on climate change mitigation on a regional scale. We focus on the EU End of Waste (EoW) policy, which aims at reducing negative impacts on the environment through the minimization of generated waste. At the same time, the EU climate objectives set challenging goals for the industry to lower greenhouse gas emissions. We argue that the goals of these two policies are conflicting: under certain circumstances, the EoW will lead into increased greenhouse gas emissions because of a number of negative feedback effects that function on multiple spatial and temporal scales.To assess the effects of waste recovery on greenhouse gas emissions, we carry out a consequential life-cycle inventory on a proposed industrial ecosystem around the Gulf of Bothnia between Finland and Sweden. The system recovers currently unutilized steelmaking dust and slag from four steel mills in Finland and Sweden and converts them into iron and zinc raw materials in a novel rotary hearth furnace. The recovered iron is led back into the blast furnace of one of the steel mills and zinc is treated in an existing zinc plant. In the European scale, the model system is significant in size, serving thus as a model for integrated EoW and carbon footprint assessments in other similar cases within the EU.The analysis reveals the relative greenhouse gas emissions from raw material extraction and production, heat and power generation, transport and the production process itself, in comparison to the present system with limited material recovery. To test the model viability, we conduct a sensitivity analysis with respect to increasing energy and production capacity. Our analysis shows that from the point of view of a single operator, material recovery may bring noteworthy reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. If the scale of the assessment is expanded beyond the confines of a single plant, however, we find limited potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions through further recovery of steelmaking residues. In conclusion, we provide policy recommendations with which the EoW paradigm can provide better support for climate change mitigation on a regional scale.     

电动与内燃机汽车的动力系统生命周期环境影响对比分析

以国内某两款同一车型的电动与内燃机汽车的动力系统为研究对象,通过生命周期分析软件GaBi建立生命周期评价(LCA)模型,在清单数据分析的基础上,采用CML2001模型对两种动力系统分别进行了定量的生命周期环境影响评价.评价结果表明,电动汽车动力系统的全生命周期综合环境影响比内燃机汽车动力系统高60.15％,并分别通过回收阶段分析、电能结构分析和敏感性分析对这一结果进行了解释:回收阶段中酸化、富营养化和光化学臭氧合成3种环境影响类型的直接排放大于回收得到的环境效益;电动汽车动力系统的环境影响随着火力发电比例的下降而减小,增大水能、风力和核能发电在电力系统中所占比例能有效降低电动汽车对环境的影响;动力系统重量对电动汽车动力系统的环境排放影响最为敏感,电池充电效率次之,制造阶段能耗的敏感度最小.将动力系统使用阶段的环境影响分配到整车,则电动汽车的生命周期环境影响比内燃机汽车低0.14％,且主要环境影响类型是全球变暖、酸化和富营养化.     

An integrated climate change assessment for the Northeast United States

The papers in this Special Issue are the primary technical underpinnings for the Northeast Climate Impacts Assessment (NECIA), an integrated regional-scale assessment of projected climate change, impacts and options for mitigation and adaptation across the US Northeast. The consequences of future pathways of greenhouse gas emissions on projected climate and impacts across climate-sensitive sectors is assessed by using downscaled projections from three global climate models under both higher (Alfi) and lower (B1) emissions scenarios. The findings illustrate that near-term reductions in emissions can greatly reduce the extent and severity of regionally important impacts on natural and managed ecosystems and public health in the latter half of this century, and increase the feasibility that those impacts which are now unavoidable can be successfully managed through adaptation.     

Measuring the environmental performance of IPPC industry: I. Devising a quantitative science-based and policy-weighted Environmental Emissions Index

This paper describes the derivation of an Environmental Emissions Index (EEI) intended to quantify the environmental performance of Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) installations and sectors. Characterisation and normalisation methods used in lifecycle analyses were applied to 20 routinely reported emissions parameters, pertaining to six environmental impact categories. Distance to policy targets for relevant emissions were used to weight impact categories, and link the EEI to policy priorities. Ireland and the EU15 were considered as scales of context. The European Pollutant Emission Register was a convenient source of normalisation data, but restricted the context of the EEI to industrial emissions, and distorted outputs. Using national and EU15 total loading estimates for normalisation resulted in an EEI that better reflected the relative contribution of reported emissions towards overall environmental pressures. Using Ireland's pharmaceutical sector as a case study indicated that weighting factors, and the toxicity range of NMVOC emissions, were the largest sources of EEI uncertainty. Through the integration of inventory data, scientific characterisation, and policy targets, the EEI translates reported emissions data from IPPC installations and sectors into a benchmark of environmental performance. It may be regarded as an evolving tool of potential utility to regulators and policy makers.     

生物液体燃料发展的环境影响研究进展

第二代生物燃料生产技术已发展起来,有关生物液体燃料发展的环境影响研究,毁誉参半、争论激烈。论文在查阅大量国内外相关文献的基础上,评述了生物液体燃料的发展进程及其对温室气体减排、水土资源及生物多样性等方面的影响,并就生物液体燃料环境影响的研究趋势与发展方向进行了讨论。研究认为:①一些学者认为,就温室气体减排来看,尽管效益不同,但生物液体燃料均在一定程度上减轻了温室气体排放。也有学者认为生物液体燃料与化石燃料相比并没有减少温室气体排放,甚至更糟。②大规模的能源作物集约种植消耗了大量水资源,污染了地下水,破坏了土壤碳库,降低了土壤肥力,加剧了水土流失。此外,土地利用方式改变造成的潜在影响具有很大的不确定性。但也有研究表示选择合适的能源物种及科学的耕作方式也有可能对水土资源带来积极的影响。③生物液体燃料发展对生物多样性产生了危害,但恰当的管理方式亦可能带来正效益。导致研究结论差异巨大的原因主要在于研究角度与尺度不同、研究方法的复杂性和数据的精度及可获得性等。明确边界、统一路径,细化指标、规范标准,系统分析、定量评价应是生物液体燃料的环境影响研究的发展方向。     

An assessment of greenhouse gas emissions and material flows caused by the Finnish economy using the ENVIMAT model

An environmentally extended input-output (EE-IO) analysis - environmental impacts of material flows caused by the Finnish economy - was carried out in order to improve data on production and consumption in Finland. The study resulted in the ENVIMAT model, which can be used to analyze the relationship between material flows, environmental impacts and the economy. The model is based on monetary and physical input-output tables and an environmental life-cycle impact assessment. This article summarizes the main methodological aspects and findings regarding the material flows and climate impacts caused by the Finnish economy in 2002 and 2005. The Finnish model has relatively detailed input data with 150 industries and 918 products and the data on imports was assessed according to a mixed approach with the help of life-cycle inventory data. The results of the model showed that the Finnish economy uses imported material resources as much as domestic resources. Life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions caused by imports were equivalent to 70-80% of domestic emissions. The GHG emissions embodied in imports (emissions abroad) and exports (emissions within Finland) were of the same magnitude. The analysis showed that the service sector accounted for 44% of GHG emissions caused by the domestic final use of products. Analysis of the results also showed that the indicator of total material requirement (TMR) should not be used for environmental impact comparisons of products and services. In the future, the aim is to use the ENVIMAT model for assessing temporal changes in the economy; for monitoring sustainable development; for planning climate change mitigation; and for identifying important factors in the economy and assessing their impacts.     

Carbon footprint of food - approaches from national input-output statistics and a LCA of a food portion

The aim of the study, on which this paper is based, was to provide guidance to consumers to make environmentally responsible choices in their food consumption, to assist food supply chain stakeholders to identify the key areas for environmental improvements, and to provide policy makers with a tool for monitoring the potential impacts on climate change resulting from developments within the food sector. At the macro level, the EIO-LCA model was developed specifically for the Finnish food chain; at the micro level, LCAs were performed on 30 lunch portions. The contribution of the Finnish food chain to climate change was 14%, which comprised 40% CO₂ emissions, 25% CH₄ emissions, and 34% N₂O emissions. The share of impacts from domestic agricultural processes was the highest, at 69%. The impact of a single lunch portion ranged between 0.65 and 3.80 kg of equivalent CO₂. According to the EIO-LCA model, the average impact was 7.7 kg CO₂ eq/person daily. The consumer phase accounted for between 8 and 47% of the climate change impacts for homemade portions. In ready-to-eat portions industry and retail phases were emphasized, representing 25-38% of climate change impacts. We present an approach to steer the Finnish food sector onto an environmentally sustainable path; practical tools for consumers and farmers will especially need to be developed further.     

Environmental impact of cement production: detail of the different processes and cement plant variability evaluation

This study evaluates the environmental impact of the cement production and its variations between different cement plants, using Life Cycle Impact Assessment. For that purpose, details of the cement production processes are investigated in order to show the respective part of raw materials preparation and clinker production using environmental impacts calculated with CML01 indicators. For the kiln emission data, a European pollutant emission register for French intensive industries is used to quantify the variability of indicators between cement plants. For the CML01 indicators that are controlled by kiln emissions, some of them (i.e. global warming, photochemical oxidation) show variations between cement plants between 20 and 30%, as for other (i.e. acidification, eutrophication, terrestrial ecotoxicity) variations are greater than 40% due to the lack of accurate measurements on both pollutant content and annual flow. Finally, a normalisation, using Western Europe yearly emissions is performed and permits to highlight among all the CML01 indicators which ones are the main impacts for the cement production. Abiotic depletion, global warming, acidification and marine ecotoxicity are the four identified impacts.     

Cleaner production in Danish fish processing – experiences,status and possible future strategies

Danish fish processing industry has been one of the pioneers regarding implementation of cleaner production and environmental management systems. This article describes the experiences with cleaner production (CP) among leading Danish industries producing pickled herring and canned mackerel. The article emphasizes two case studies of ‘first mover’ companies, but data from other ‘proactive’ companies are also included.The article provides an overview of different types of CP solutions, improvement potentials, synergistic effects and possible trade-offs. The development of the applied solutions from the late 1980s until today are analysed and recommendations to future strategies at company level and policy level are provided.It is concluded that significant environmental improvements have been obtained for the analysed companies – especially concerning reductions in water consumption, wastewater emissions, and utilisation of fish ‘waste’ for valuable by-products. Still, more focus could be placed on the reduction of energy consumption, change of packaging types, and environmental impacts in other stages of the products life cycle.Authorities and companies have mainly focused on on-site reductions of wastewater emissions, but life cycle assessments show that more attention should be given to the reductions of environmental impacts in other parts of the product chain, e.g. fishing operations and transport as well.     

铝电解工业全氟化碳减排途径研究

铝电解技术迈入了新的发展阶段,铝电解技术与设备的环保节能研究已成为技术发展的主题。在过去20年间,单位铝电解产品的全氟化碳(PFCs)排放削减量达86%。由于PFCs目前被认为具有高温室气体暖化潜势的气体,也是《京都议定书》控制的6种温室气体之一,对气候的影响能力不可忽视。全球各电解铝企业、环保部门及相关研究机构仍在不断努力探索各种减排措施。从铝电解工业中PFCs的排放状况、产生与排放机理、控制途径、激励措施等方面进行减排途径的研究和分析。     

Vulnerability of exporting nations to the development of a carbon label in the United Kingdom

Carbon labels inform consumers about the amount of greenhouse gases (GHGs) released during the production and consumption of goods, including food. In the future consumer and legislative responses to carbon labels may favour goods with lower emissions, and thereby change established supply chains. This may have unintended consequences.We present the carbon footprint of three horticultural goods of different origins supplied to the United Kingdom market: lettuce, broccoli and green beans. Analysis of these footprints enables the characterisation of three different classes of vulnerability which are related to: transport, national economy and supply chain specifics.There is no simple relationship between the characteristics of an exporting country and its vulnerability to the introduction of a carbon label. Geographically distant developing countries with a high level of substitutable exports to the UK are most vulnerable. However, many developing countries have low vulnerability as their main exports are tropical crops which would be hard to substitute with local produce.In the short term it is unlikely that consumers will respond to carbon labels in such a way that will have major impacts in the horticultural sector. Labels which require contractual reductions in GHG emissions may have greater impacts in the short term.     

Life cycle assessment of coated white board: a case study in China

Life cycle assessment was carried out using IMPACT2002+ to estimate the environmental impact of coated white board production, which is common in China. Normalized results showed that the potential impacts of respiratory inorganics, terrestrial ecotoxicity, global warming, and non-renewable energy had a dominant contributions to overall environmental impact. Specifically, emissions from chemical and energy production processes exhibited higher potential impact (more than 80% of the total contribution) on the environment than that of emissions generated from transport, landfill, wastewater treatment, and paper plants infrastructure. Energy recovery from black liquor and energy generation based on natural gas are key factors in reducing overall environmental potential impact. The current paper presents improvements on the environmental performance of a coated white board production site in China.     

苏州市生活垃圾处理碳足迹核查

根据《PAS2050规范》的指导,结合生命周期评价技术方法和LandGEM模型,对苏州市生活垃圾填埋和焚烧处理的生命周期过程进行了碳足迹核查. 详细列出了垃圾处理过程中可能的温室气体排放源,计算各排放源的电耗或能耗,并通过与温室气体排放系数相乘最终转化为苏州市生活垃圾处理温室气体排放量. 结果表明:苏州市填埋处理1 t生活垃圾整个生命周期过程中温室气体的排放量(以CO₂当量计)为1 942.47 kg,焚烧处理为-180.87 kg. 按照目前苏州市生活垃圾处理权重进行分配,可得苏州市处理1 t生活垃圾整个生命周期过程中温室气体的排放量(以CO₂当量计)为880.80 kg. 在整个核查过程中,考虑了在填埋和焚烧处理时发电对温室气体带来的减量效应.      

Life cycle assessment of offset printed matter with EDIP97: how important are emissions of chemicals?

Existing product life cycle assessment (LCA) studies on offset printed matter all point at paper as the overall dominating cause of environmental impacts. All studies focus on energy consumption and the dominating role of paper is primarily based on the energy-related impact categories: global warming, acidification and nutrient enrichment. Ecotoxicity and human toxicity, which are related to emissions of chemicals, etc., are only included to a limited degree or not at all. In this paper we include the impacts from chemicals emitted during the life cycle of sheet fed offset printed matter. This is done by making use of some of the newest knowledge about emissions from the production at the printing industry combined with knowledge about the composition of the printing materials used. In cases with available data also upstream emissions from the production of printing materials are included. The results show that inclusion of the chemical emission-related impacts makes the EDIP97 impact profile of sheet fed offset products much more varied, as well for the normalised profiles as for the profiles weighted by distance to political environmental targets. Especially the ecotoxicity impact potential related to the production stage may contribute significantly, and the use of paper no longer becomes the overall dominating factor driving the environmental impacts.     

Emergy as a tool for Ecodesign: evaluating materials selection for beverage packages in Brazil

The life of a product begins with the initial product design concepts; the costs and potential impacts of a product are heavily influenced by the final design, the production processes, the economic and environmental costs of all raw materials. Additionally, both of these factors are very much affected by how the products are managed during and after consumer usage. Thus, there is an urgent need for a tool to facilitate the integration and assessment of environmental and economic demands into the product planning and development processes. The introduction of environmental accounting based on emergy as a tool to assist in product design is proposed. This complementary tool may be inserted into the conventional design methodology to facilitate in the selection of materials and processes as well as in the actual design of the products. To illustrate the application of the proposed method for material selection, PET (polyethylene terephthalate) bottles and aluminum cans for beverage packaging are compared. Despite the exceptional condition of aluminum recycling in Brazil, results show that the best option for beverage packages is the PET bottles.     

国际标准差异对产品碳足迹核算的影响分析——以胶版印刷纸为例

产品碳足迹以碳标签的形式日益广泛地应用于产品供应链，通过影响企业和消费者行为而有效地促进全球碳减排.然而产品碳足迹核算标准种类繁多，不同标准对产品碳足迹的核算规定存在差异，致使其核算结果难于有效对比.本文以胶版印刷纸为例，对比分析了目前最权威的3个国际标准PAS2050、GHG Protocol和ISO14067，识别了三者对于8点产品碳足迹核算要素的不同规定，定量解析了标准差异对产品碳足迹核算的影响.结果表明，3个标准规定的差异可导致产品碳足迹核算结果产生较大的不确定性，GHG Protocol和ISO14067结果分别比PAS2050高61%和49%，其中，"碳存储、消费者交通、固定资产和延迟排放加权影响"4个方面的差异对案例产品碳足迹影响最为显著.因此，按照产品类别制定统一的核算要求是碳标签交流对比的基本前提，明晰的标准规定是降低核算结果不确定性的必要途径.