Life cycle assessment (LCA) is an increasingly used tool for environmental assessment of products and services, involving a comprehensive analysis of the potential environmental impacts associated to supply chains, from a product’s ’cradle’ to its ’grave’. We present what to our knowledge constitutes the first LCA applied to chitin and chitosan production based on primary data from two real producers, located in Europe and India, respectively. Production in Europe corresponds to a chitosan for the medical sector, manufactured from chitin produced in China with shells from snow crab caught in teh Atlantic coast of Canada, whereas production in India corresponds to a general-purpose chitosan manufactured from chitin produced from shrimp shells caught in the Arabian Sea.The goal of the LCA was to understand the main ’hotspots’ in the two supply chains, which are substantially different in terms of raw materials and production locations. The product system for each supply chain included the production of raw materials, their processing to produce chitin and the manufacture of chitosan. Primary data for chitin and chitosan production were obtained from the actual producers, whereas raw material acquisition as well as waste management activities were based on literature sources. The effects of indirect land use change (iLUC), i.e. potential deforestation associated to the demand for land, were also included. Impact assessment was carried out by means of the recommended methods in the International Life Cycle Data (ILCD) handbook, which includes 15 indicators such as greenhouse-gas emissions, water use and land occupation.
In the Indian supply chain, the production of chemicals (HCl and NaOH) appears as an important hotspot. The use of shrimp shells as raw material affects the market for animal feed, resulting in a beneficial effect in many indicators, especially in water use. The use of protein waste as fertilizer is also an important source of greenhouse-gas and ammonia emissions. In the European supply chain, energy use is the key driver for environmental impacts, namely heat production based on coal in China, and electricity production in China and Europe. The use of crab shells as raw material avoids the composting process they would be otherwise subject to, leading to a saving in composting emissions, especially ammonia. In the Indian supply chain, the effect of iLUC is relevant, whereas in the European one it is negligible.
Even though we assessed two products from the same family, the results show that they have very different environmental profiles, reflecting their substantially different supply chains in terms of raw material (shrimp shells vs. crab shells), production locations (locally produced vs. a global supply chain involving three continents), as well as the different applications (general-purpose chitosan vs. chitosan for the medical sector).
Acknowledgement: This work was supported by European Union project “NanoBioEngineering of BioInspired BioPolymers” which has received funding from the European Union‘s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no 613931.
Slides available here:EUCHIS LCA chitosan 2017 Sevilla.
The primary production of rare earth elements (REE) used in neodymium-iron-boron (Nd-Fe-B) magnets is associated with environmental impacts from both mining and processing. It has been suggested that recycling of scrap Nd-Fe-B magnets would reduce primary production of REE, and thus environmental impacts. However, existing studies on environmental effects of recycling based on the methodology of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) do not take into account the so-called balance problem, which accounts for the fact that all elements co-occuring in the ore are jointly produced, resulting in either an excess or a shortage of individual elements. We develop a two-part approach to incorporate this issue into LCA. In the first part, we investigate the effects of introducing large-scale Nd-Fe-B recycling to the global rare earth market. A production model is presented that quantifies the potential market effects of secondary production (recycling) on the balance problem. Results show that primary production could partly be avoided when introducing a secondary production route to the rare earth market, whilst still meeting demand for joint (non-magnet) REE, only produced from the primary route. The production model will be used for a consequential life cycle assessment study which will be published as a separate paper (Part II). In addition, we show that our approach may also be interesting for other LCA studies, where effects of market changes on a co-production system are investigated.
This report is published as part of the Ph.D. thesis: Life cycle assessment of rapeseed oil and palm oil by Jannick Schmidt.
The thesis consists of three parts:
1. Part 1: Summary report. The summary report describes the overall problem of the Ph.D. project, the research outline, summaries of the research and perspectives and recommendations.
2. Part 2: Article collection (6 scientific articles) The article collection presents the core of the scientific output of the Ph.D. project.
3. Part 3: Life cycle inventory of rapeseed oil and palm oil.
This life cycle inventory report provides and documents the background material for the scientific article: Comparative life cycle assessment of rapeseed oil and palm oil (published in part two of the thesis). This includes definition of system boundaries, the collected data, the modelling of the investigated system, sensitivity analyses and an evaluation of sensitivity, completeness and consistency. The inventory report has character of an appendix report to the life cycle assessment.
This report is carried out by Jannick Schmidt (2.-0 LCA consultants, Denmark) for United Plantations Berhad (Teluk Intan, Malaysia). The study includes data collection and calculation of LCA results for United Plantations Berhad’s palm oil production 2004-2016. The study was undertaken during the period January to February 2017. The current report updates results of a series of previous studies to also including 2016, and it summarises the main findings of a detailed life cycle assessment report of palm oil production at United Plantations 2004-2016: Schmidt (2017), Life cycle assessment of Palm Oil at United plantations Berhad 2017, Results for 2004-2016. United Plantations Berhad, Teluk Intan, Malaysia.
This report has been prepared by Bo P. Weidema, Marie de Saxcé, and Ivan Muñoz of 2.-0 LCA consultants, Denmark, for the Nordic Alcohol Monopolies (Alko in Finland represented by Virpi Valtonen and Kirsi Erme, Systembolaget in Sweden represented by Lena Rogeman and Maria Hagström, and Vinmonopolet in Norway represented by Frank Lein). The study was undertaken in 2015-2016. The data relates to the turnover of the Nordic Alcohol Monopolies in year 2014. Some data have been removed for confidentiality reasons.
The aim of this article is to present the first life cycle assessment of chitosan production based on data from two real producers located in India and Europe. The goal of the life cycle assessment (LCA) was to understand the main hot spots in the two supply chains, which are substantially different in terms of raw materials and production locations.
The LCA is based on consequential modelling principles, whereby allocation is avoided by means of substitution, and market mixes include only flexible, i.e. non-constrained suppliers. The product system is cradle to gate and includes the production of raw materials, namely waste shells from snow crab and shrimp in Canada and India, respectively, the processing of these in China and India and the manufacture of chitosan in Europe and India. Primary data for chitin and chitosan production were obtained from the actual producers, whereas raw material acquisition as well as waste management activities were based on literature sources. The effects of indirect land use change (iLUC) were also included. Impact assessment was carried out at midpoint level by means of the recommended methods in the International Life Cycle Data (ILCD) handbook.
In the Indian supply chain, the production of chemicals (HCl and NaOH) appears as an important hot spot. The use of shrimp shells as raw material affects the market for animal feed, resulting in a credit in many impact indicators, especially in water use. The use of protein waste as fertilizer is also an important source of greenhouse-gas and ammonia emissions. In the European supply chain, energy use is the key driver for environmental impacts, namely heat production based on coal in China and electricity production in China and Europe. The use of crab shells as raw material avoids the composting process they would be otherwise subject to, leading to a saving in composting emissions, especially ammonia. In the Indian supply chain, the effect of iLUC is relevant, whereas in the European one, it is negligible.
Even though we assessed two products from the same family, the results show that they have very different environmental profiles, reflecting their substantially different supply chains in terms of raw material (shrimp shells vs. crab shells), production locations (locally produced vs. a global supply chain involving three continents) and the different applications (general-purpose chitosan vs. chitosan for the medical sector).
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This report presents the results of the Carbon Foot-printing (CF) of milk production in the United Kingdom and in Germany in 1990.
Milk production is often related to large area of grassland. For this reason the United Kingdom and Germany are among the most important milk producers’ countries in the European Union, together with Holland, Denmark, Belgium and some regions of France and Italy. In particular, Northern Ireland, Scotland and the South West of England are the regions in the United Kingdom with the highest milk production. Similarly, in Germany the milk production is concentrated in the grassland rich northern region of Schleswig-Holstein, in the North West part of Lower Saxony, in the central Thuringia and in the South Eastern Bavaria (Eurostat 2013).
The most common dairy cow in Britain is the black and white Holstein-Friesian breed that represents 90% of the British herd. Other breeds that can be seen are the Ayrshire, Jersey and Guernsey (DairyCo 2013). More than 80% of dairy cows in Germany belong to the major breeds German Holstein (both black and white and red and white), the German Fleckvieh (Simmental) and the German Braunvieh (Brown Swiss). The diversity of the cattle breeds depends on regional climate differences and fodder availability. In the North and East German Holstein are the most common breeds. In the south Simmental and Brown Swiss Cattle are dominant (German Livestock 2013).
The study focuses mostly on 1990 national data when these are available, or on national data collected in the following years when data from 1990 are not available. In case data are not available, figures relative to the CF of milk production in 1990 in Denmark are used (Dalgaard and Schmidt 2012a). In particular, the following changes are applied to Dalgaard and Schmidt (2012a):
- Milk yields and feed intake.
- Electricity mix in the United Kingdom.
- Crop yields, straw removal, type and amount of fertiliser applied to feed crops (Section 4.1).
- Prices (Appendix C).
The most important animal-related factors when analyzing the milk system are the lactation, amount of feed intake, the live weight and milk yield. Among these factors there are partial interactions. Therefore most of the effects are related to each other.
The milk yield in the United Kingdom in 1990 was 15,251 t of raw milk and 31,307 t in Germany (FAOSTAT 2013). The average live weight of animals was 572 kg and 608 kg respectively in the UK and Germany. Data concerning the composition of feed are also important. However information concerning composition of ration is not always available for 1990 or difficult to find.
This report presents a detailed life cycle inventory (LCI) and LCIA results on GHG emissions for milk produced in Germany, Denmark, Sweden and United Kingdom in 2012, as well as results for 1990. The current study has been conducted during 2015 and 2016, and it draws upon the methodology developed and documented in:
Schmidt and Dalgaard (2012). National and farm level carbon footprint of milk – Methodology and results for Danish and Swedish milk 2005 at farm gate. Arla Foods, Aarhus, Denmark.
The underlying life cycle inventory (LCI) for the presented LCIA results for 1990 are documented in:
In this paper, the environmental and economic impacts of the life cycle of an advanced lithium based energy storage system (ESS) for a battery electric vehicle are assessed. The methodology followed to perform the study is a Multiregional Input–Output (MRIO) analysis, with a world IO table that combines detailed information on national production activities and international trade data for 40 countries and a region called Rest of the World. The life cycle stages considered in the study are manufacturing, use and recycling. The functional unit is one ESS with a 150,000 km lifetime. The results of the MRIO analysis show the stimulation that the life cycle of the EES has in the economy, in terms of production of goods and services. The manufacturing is the life cycle stage with the highest environmental load for all the impact categories assessed. The geographical resolution of the results show the relevance that some countries may have in the environmental performance of the assessed product even if they are not directly involved in any of the stages of the life cycle, proving the significance of the indirect effects.
The general objective of the project is to develop and demonstrate a robust but flexible integrated solution for treating water flows with variable compositions allowing subsequent reuse. Due to the variability of water characteristics the O&G sector is an excellent training station to improve water technologies, even for other industrial or municipal applications.
This new solution will be comprised by innovative treatment technologies effectively operated and optimized through a novel Decision Support System (DSS) which can generate water of enough quality to be reused, increasing the overall sustainability of the O&G sector. The DSS will be accessible remotely through innovative mixed of ICT technology (e.g. long range, short range low-data rate wireless technologies and internet protocol) that enables fast information access, advanced visualization and data analysis, allowing the system to be operated with minimal process understanding and also ensuring the safety of the operational staff at the extraction and refining sites. In summary, the main objectives are:
Read more in our INTEGROIL - flyer or in the publication: Life cycle assessment of wastewater reclamation in a petroleum refinery in Turkey
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