This report presents a summary of a detailed life cycle assessment (LCA) study of palm oil production at United Plantations Berhad (Teluk Intan, Malaysia). LCA is a technique to assess environmental impacts associated with all the life cycle stages of a product or service from ‘cradle to grave’. The current study is a desk-study performed on the distance, carried out January to February 2025, and it builds on top of six other large studies
carried out for United Plantations in 2008, 2011, 2014, 2017, 2020, and 2023. The study in 2008 was the first LCA of palm oil ever, which is fully compliant with and critical reviewed according to the international standards on LCA: ISO 14040 and 14044.
The environmental impact of palm oil is presented as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, i.e. carbon footprint, as well as for a number of other impact categories such as biodiversity, respiratory effects and toxicity. The environmental impacts relate to the life cycle of palm oil from cultivation to the gate of the refinery, including all upstream emissions, e.g. from the production of fertilisers, fuels and machinery. The results are shown per
kg of refined palm oil, as well as for United Plantations total product portfolio (corporate GHG footprint).
Over the last decades, United Plantations Berhad has worked intensively in reducing their environmental impacts. The effect of this work is illustrated by tracking the carbon footprint for the company’s production of
palm oil from 2004 to 2024.
The primary purpose of the LCA is to document and assess the environmental impacts from the production of palm oil at United Plantations Berhad. Secondly, the purpose is to follow over time the GHG emissions from the production of palm oil at United Plantations Berhad. Thirdly, to quantify the absolute impact of United Plantations’ product portfolio, fourthly, to compare United Plantation’s production of palm oil with average
Malaysian/Indonesian palm oil and other major vegetable oils, and fifthly, to analyse improvement options for United Plantation’s production of palm oil.
The functional unit is central for an LCA. The functional unit is a quantified performance of the product under study for use as a reference unit, i.e. it is what all the results relate to. The functional unit is defined as 1 kg of neutralized, bleached and deodorized (NBD) vegetable oil for food purposes at refinery gate. The distribution, use and disposal stages are not included.
In addition to the functional unit mentioned above, the life cycle results are also shown for United Plantations total product portfolio, i.e. for the sum of all products supplied by United Plantations in 2024.
The oil palm cultivation stage is inventoried for the thirteen oil palm estates owned by United Plantations (ten in Malaysia and three in Indonesia). Similarly, the palm oil mill stage is inventoried for United Plantations’ five palm oil mills (four in Malaysia and one in Indonesia). The refinery state includes an inventory of United Plantations two refineries in Malaysia; Unitata and UniFuji. The data for United Plantations’ estates, palm oil
mills and refineries have been collected in collaboration with the United Plantations Research Department (UPRD) and Sustainability Department. Data for activities outside United Plantations, such as production of fertiliser, fuels and machinery, are obtained from the EXIOBASE database (hybrid version 3.3.13).
The link between land use (e.g. occupation of 1 hectare during one year) and deforestation and related emissions and biodiversity impacts are included in the study. Since the cultivation of oil palm takes place on already cleared land, it is not associated with any direct deforestation activities – except at replanting which is not associated with impacts because it involves conversion from oil palm to oil palm. However, the use of land
for oil palm contributes to the general pressure on land, leading to land use changes somewhere else. This is referred to as indirect land use changes (iLUC). This study covers iLUC by means of a model documented in Schmidt et al. (2015) and its integration in the EXIOBASE database (Schmidt and De Rosa 2018). This model considers that demand for land leads to two main effects: conversion of land (land use changes) and intensification of land already in use – both effects are associated with GHG emissions.
Besides the iLUC effects described above, the benefits from nature conservation are also included in the study. United Plantations has set-aside large areas as nature conservation in their land bank in Indonesia as well as some smaller areas in Malaysia. The effect of nature conservation is that conversion from forest to oil palm is avoided locally. However, since the decision to conserve land does not reduce the overall demand for land, an equivalent amount of land needs to be taken into production somewhere else, i.e. indirect land use changes are induced. The benefit of nature conservation is the difference between the avoided local impact and the induced indirect impact.
The results are calculated in three different ways:
The most significant impact categories are global warming, respiratory effects, and nature occupation (biodiversity impacts caused by land use changes). All results exclude the stored carbon in the vegetable oil, i.e. CO2 uptake in the cultivation stage, which is released again in either the use stage or the end-of-life stage, which are not included in the LCA.
The contribution to global warming (not including iLUC) from 1 kg NBD palm oil produced in United Plantations in 2024 is 1.62 kg CO2-eq. The major part of the impact originates from the oil palm cultivation stage where the main contributors are field emissions of CO2 from oxidation of peat soils and N2O. Previously, one of the main contributions were methane from POME treatment at the oil mills. However, this has been almost eliminated by installation of methane capture facilities at all palm oil mills; the first was installed in 2006, and in 2018 all oil mills had installed biogas capture.
When iLUC is included, the total contribution to GHG emissions is 1.87 kg CO2-eq. per kg NBD palm oil. Hence, iLUC is a significant contributor to GHG emissions.
When including nature conservation too, the impact from the Indonesian production decreases significantly – the offsets from nature conservation reduces the GHG emissions per kg NBD palm oil of UP’s Indonesian production from 2.34 kg CO2-eq. to 0.12 CO2-eq. For United Plantations’ entire palm oil production, the nature conservation in Indonesia reduces the GHG emissions from 1.87 to 1.47 CO2-eq. per kg oil.
The time series for NBD palm oil at United Plantations show a reduction from 2004 to 2024 of 53% (without iLUC), 49% (with iLUC) and 60% with iLUC and nature conservation. Reductions in GHG emissions levels are seen when new technology have been installed replacing older less clean technologies; this mainly relates to the installation of biogas plants and avoiding methane emissions from anaerobic digestion in POME treatment.
A large reduction was also obtained with the increased area of nature conservation. Also, the implementation of new technology in refineries and integration of the energy supply between the Jendarata oil mill and Unitata refinery as well as the Optimill and the UniFuji refinery have contributed to optimised utilization of excess energy from the oil mills.
United Plantations’ production of palm oil has been compared with industry averages for three major vegetable oils, namely RSPO certified palm oil and non-certified palm oil (Malaysia/Indonesia), rapeseed oil (Europe), and sunflower oil (Ukraine). The comparison shows that palm oil at United Plantations in 2024 performs better than all the other oils for all compared impact categories.
The GHG emissions associated to United Plantations’ total product portfolio, i.e. all the products sold by UP, are 782,300 t CO2-eq (without iLUC), 903,200 t CO2-eq (with iLUC), and 791,000 t CO2-eq (with iLUC and nature conservation).
This year’s LCA report includes a section describing key methodological differences between United Plantations (UP) LCA and the PalmGHG tool.
