The project assessed the climate impacts of different biofuels including indirect land use changes (iLUC), time dependency of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and manipulation of the carbon in biomass and soil carbon. The project resulted in a project report that acted as a the scientific background for Concito's own report "Klimapåvirkningen fra biomasse og andre energikilder" (in Danish).
Due to concerns about the sustainability of the energy sector, conversion of biomass to energy is increasing its hold globally. Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) is being adopted as an analytical tool to assess the environmental impacts in the entire cycle of biomass production and conversions to different products. This study deals with the LCIA of straw conversion to district heat in a Combined Heat and Power (CHP) plant and in a district heating boiler (producing heat only). Environmental impact categories are Global Warming Potential (GWP), Acidification Potential (AP), aquatic and terrestrial Eutrophication Potential (EP) and Non-Renewable Energy (NRE) use. In the case of CHP, the co-produced electricity is assumed to displace the marginal Danish electricity mix. The current study showed that straw fired in the CHP plant would lead to a GWP of −187 g CO2-eq, AP 0.01 m2 UES (un-protected ecosystem), aquatic EP 0.16 g NO3-eq, terrestrial EP 0.008 m2 UES, and NRE use −0.14 MJ-primary per 1 MJ heat production. Straw conversion to heat in the CHP plant showed better environmental performances compared to the district heating boiler. Furthermore, removing straw from the field is related to the consequence e.g. decline in soil carbon sequestration, limiting soil nutrient availability, and when compared with natural gas the conversion of straw to heat would lead to a higher aquatic and terrestrial EP and AP. The study also outlays spaces for the detail sustainability assessment of straw conversion in a biorefinery and compare with the current study.
The coal-based power generation industry faces increased pressure to improve its environmental performance in the light of concerns over greenhouse gas emissions, water availability and releases of both acid gases and metals to air and water. Assessment of its environmental performance requires a methodology whereby all environmental impacts can be assessed accurately in full cognisance of their spatial and temporal dimensions, while taking into account the social acceptability of technologies employed. In this work, a methodology is developed to determine the environmental impact associated with solid wastes generated by this industry, and the application of this to the specific case of ash management is demonstrated. This methodology involves a consideration of leachate generation processes from ash impoundments, and subsequent mobility of leached components into groundwater, with due attention given to an analysis of pertinent physico-chemical phenomena. This analysis results in the identification of a time-dependent concentration profile of mobile constituents at the interface between the ash impoundment and the surrounding environment. The integration of leachate prediction modelling with plume dispersion modelling tools provides a measure of the extent to which a land mass is affected by any subsequent leachate migration. In this way it is possible to obtain a time dependent footprint of affected land which could be used as a semi-site specific indicator of the environmental impact of solid waste management practices.
The main goal of DESIRE is to develop and apply an optimal set of indicators to monitor European progress towards resource-efficiency. This is done through a combination of time series of environmentally extended input output data (EE IO) and the DPSIR framework to construct the indicator set. This approach will use a single data set that allows for consistent construction of resource efficiency indicators capturing the EU, country, sector and product group level, and the production and consumption perspective including impacts outside the EU. The project
a) improves data availability, particularly by creating EE IO time series and now-casted data using Eurostat data and data from research databases.
b) improves calculation methods for indicators that currently still lack scientific robustness, most notably in the field of biodiversity/ecosystem services and critical materials. Novel reference indicators for economic success (‘Beyond GDP and Value added’) are developed.
c) explicitly addresses the problem of indicator proliferation and limits in available data that have a ‘statistical stamp’. Via scientific analysis the smallest set of indicators giving mutually independent information is selected, and it is demonstrated which shortcuts in (statistical) data inventory can be made without significant loss of quality.
The project comprises further policy analysis and indicator concept development in support of sustainability monitoring at the EU level and as such is related to the CREEA project. See also our presentation for SETAC Europe 24th Annual Meeting.
Reports for the project written by or with contributions by 2.-0 LCA consultants are:
Physical/hybrid supply use tables - methodological-report
D5.2 Interim report on data processing creating EE IO time series and now-casted data
D5.3 Integrated report on EE IO related macro resource indicator time series
D10.2 Final report with indicator framework, indicator set and implementation roadmap
See also two central publications in Journal of Industrial Ecology: Methodology for the construction of global multi-regional hybrid supply and use tables for the EXIOBASE v3 database and EXIOBASE 3: Developing a time series of detailed environmentally extended multi-regional input-output tables.
More than 10% of global GHG emissions are related to land use changes (LUC). This is almost the same as global GHG emissions from transport and around half of global GHG emissions from electricity produced from coal. The magnitude of LUC emissions clearly indicates that excluding this from LCA is highly problematic. In addition, several LCIA methods suggest that land use related impacts are much more important than GHG emissions (Weidema 2015). This makes the exclusion of LUC from LCA even more problematic.
Often, the impacts from indirect land use change (iLUC) are lacking in LCA studies – or at the best, it is modelled without reasonable considerations on cause-effect relationships between the use of land and the induced effects. If iLUC impacts are not included properly in the LCA results, there is a great risk of producing misleading results. Therefore, there is an urgent need for a good generic way of modelling iLUC. This should not be limited to biofuels or some certain crops in a certain region. There is a need for a generic model that can be applied to all kinds of land using LCA processes (cultivation of crops, cattle grassland, forestry, and land for buildings and infrastructure).
In order to make such a model available, we established the iLUC Club in 2011, which now has more than 20 universities and companies as members. We are currently working on the fifth version of the model which makes use of global land use change matrices and satellite data. The model framework is documented in a peer reviewed scientic article: A framework for modelling indirect land use changes in life cycle assessment. The model has been compared with other iLUC models in a scientific paper, where it was ranked as the best performing with regard to several criteria. Further, we actively contribute to the ongoing scientific debate on iLUC.
The model strives towards establishing a cause-effect relationship between, on the one side:
and on the other side:
The model has been tested and applied in several studies:
Subscription to the iLUC Club gives access to:
An important open source output from the project is a file with the needed information for obtaining iLUC GHG emission data for any land use (arable, forest, grassland) in any country in the world (download file).
The current members include:
On occasion of the 10th anniversary of our engagement with iLUC (15th Nov. 2017) we held a free webinar - the recording from this webinar can be seen here (youtube video) and the slides here (pdf).
For subscription (or questions), please contact us. To go to the club click here.
Together with DuPont, 2.-0 LCA consultants initiated the Energy project in 2011 with the aim of establishing consequential LCIs on electricity in different countries. The project was established a club to which anyone could subscribe. In 2019 the energy club was closed and merged with the Executive Club after the methodology was implemented for the Ecoinvent database.
Data are available for the following countries/regions: Austria, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Switzerland, Chile, China, Canada, Czech Republic, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Finland, France, United Kingdom, Indonesia, India, Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, Norway. Poland, Sweden, South Africa, Turkey, Europe, World, United States.
The following sample reports are available:
The main characteristics of the project were:
It is still possible to buy electricity data for one single country without being a member of the Executive Club. This includes an intro/methodology report and a country-specific inventory report. Please enquire for current prices info@2-0-lca.com
