Papers by Keyword: LCA

Abstract: Palm Kernell Shell (PKS), a form of biomass waste can be transformed into higher-value products. In this study, PKS underwent pyrolysis process at various temperatures using a macro-thermogravimetry fixed-bed reactor. The research focuses on biochar production through slow pyrolysis and assesses the life cycle impact of biochar as a substitute for commercial fertilizer. The aim is to assess the effect of temperature variation on biochar properties and compare greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions between biochar-based and conventional fertilizers. The OpenLCA software was employed to conduct the life cycle assessment (LCA). The optimal temperature for biochar production through a slow pyrolysis process was identified as 450°C, yielding a carbon-to-nitrogen (C/N) ratio of 19.4. The study also investigated GHG emissions throughout the PKS lifecycle, involving oil palm cultivation, crude palm oil (CPO) milling, and biochar production through slow pyrolysis (cradle-to-gate). Substituting commercial NPK fertilizers with biochar in oil palm cultivation demonstrated significant reduction in GHG-related impacts, including global warming potential, acidification, eutrophication, and ecotoxicity by 3.6%, 20.7%, 10.7%, and 2.7% respectively.

Abstract: In this study, a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) was done to assess the environmental performance of kapok-based sorbent boom technology. Kapok fiber has a high potential as a natural oil sorbent due to its natural hydrophobicity, absorbance capacity, local availability, and disposability. The system boundary was set to cradle-to-gate wherein the processes involved were fiber preparation, fiber washing, fiber coating, and boom preparation. The assessment was performed using the SimaPro 9.5 software through the EcoInvent V3 (allocation, cut-off by classification - unit) database. Meanwhile, the evaluation was based on the ISO 14040:2006’s (Environmental Management) international standards and the ReCiPe 2016 model. Results from the assessment of the eighteen (18) midpoint impact categories showed that fiber washing and fiber coating have the highest adverse environmental impact. It was then followed by the boom and fiber preparations. The analyses showed that human carcinogenic toxicity (HTPc), marine ecotoxicity (METP), fine particulate matter formation (FPMF), global warming (GWP), and terrestrial acidification (TAP) were the top five (5) impact categories. This was mainly due to: (1) the use of chemicals such as ethanol (C₂H₆O) and sodium hydroxide (NaOH) for fiber modification to increase its hydrophobicity and oleophilicity; and (2) energy requirement to produce the used chemicals and operations of machines. The results of this study could be use in looking into other "green" processes and/or materials to improve the technology's efficiency and sustainability. Moreover, renewable energies such as solar and tidal can be tapped as sources of electrical power for the production of chemicals and machine operations. Further studies could investigate the cradle-to-grave approach of the life cycle analysis of kapok-based sorbent boom.

Abstract: The present Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) intends to investigate the environmental benefit of using natural fibres and/or recyclable epoxy resins for future manufacturing of small/medium wind turbine blades to handle thermoset polymer composites that are designed to be recyclable at the end of life”). LCA comparison of a modelled blade based on flax fibres reinforced recyclable epoxy resin and a traditional blade made of glass fibres and non recyclable epoxy resin is presented. In the production phase the environmental impacts of the flax fibre reinforced recyclable epoxy resin composite blade are higher than the blade based on glass fibre epoxy composite mainly due to the higher amount of epoxy resin necessary to satisfy the design criteria of the blade e.g. fatigue and deflection. The end of life is significative as the environmental impacts are reduced by the recycling and recovery of the fibres and the resin, being the resin more significative.

Abstract: Renovation of the building stock in Europe is urgent to decrease the environmental impact from the building sector and meet the United Nations climate action goals. However, it is often hard to define a robust scenario for a renovation due to numerous uncertainties, which occur during the production, operation and end-of-life stage. One can cite the loss of performance of insulation and heating systems, the replacement time of installation or the future energy prices as well as the future climate. The replacement of oil boilers with heat pumps has shown a good performance regarding costs and greenhouse gas emissions. However, due to the flow and return temperature differences, often the current heat distribution system needs to be replaced as well, which is normally done with conventional radiators or floor heating. In this paper, we analyse a new possibility of a heat distribution system with earth plastered wall. We develop a methodology on the integrated assessment of life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle cost analysis (LCCA) for the renovation scenarios and adapt the analysis of the heat pump renovation solution with conventional radiators system and the earth plastered wall for two typical residential buildings located in Switzerland. Through rigorous statistical treatment, we then propagate the possible sources of uncertainty and perform the uncertainty quantification using polynomial chaos expansion to compare the distributions of two outcomes. The results show that the solution with the earth plaster has lower overall environmental impacts and costs. It has also been noticed that the solution with the earth plaster is more robust in investment cost and embodied emissions compared to the solution with the conventional radiators.

Abstract: Bio-concretes are receiving special attention in recent research as an alternative for climate change mitigation due to their low carbon footprints. Different bio-based materials can be used, e.g., wood shavings, bamboo, rice husk, and coconut. However, various methodological parameters can influence the carbon footprint of bio-based materials, especially bio-concretes, like biogenic carbon, amount of carbon in dry matter, rotation period of bio-aggregates, and type of cementitious materials. It is important to have easier ways of estimating the carbon footprint of bio-concretes, using parameters and data easily available. This research aims to evaluate the (1) carbon footprint of different mixtures of three bio-concretes (wood bio-concrete - WBC, bamboo bio-concrete - BBC and rice husk bio-concrete - RBC), and the (2) development of GHG emissions curves for bio-concretes specification based on easily available data (such as density, biomass content, and compressive strength). Based on experimental data, the carbon footprint was performed using the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology. In order to extend the findings of this study, the context of the following four countries was evaluated: Brazil, South Africa, India, and China. In addition, the replacement of Portland cement for Supplementary Cementitious Materials (SCMs) are evaluated hypothetically. The results show that the increase of biomass content in bio-concretes and the replacement of Portland cement by SCMs leads to a radical decrease in life cycle GHG emissions. The percentage of carbon in biomass is a critical factor for reducing the carbon footprint. The WBC was the biomass that performed better for this parameter. The presented GHG emissions curves can be a useful way to estimate the carbon footprint of bio-concretes and can be adapted to other kinds of bio-concretes and countries.

Abstract: Improving the thermal performance of low-income housing in developing countries, located in tropical and subtropical regions, is one of the main challenges of the building sector. The use of mortars as building cladding is a current practice in many developing countries. Bio-based (such as bamboo particles) and earth materials have shown interesting potential for improving some thermal properties of covering mortars. In addition, bio-based earth mortars can have a lower carbon footprint than conventional mortars (typically made of cement or cement with lime) used in the building sector. The aim of this study is the evaluation of the life cycle GHG emissions of different mixtures of an engineered bio-based earth mortar mixed with bamboo particles, earth, and different cementitious materials (Portland cement, hydrated lime, metakaolin, and fly ash) and water. Four mixtures are evaluated: without bamboo particles, with 3%, 6%, and 9% of bamboo particles in volume. The thermal energy performance and carbon footprint of these mortars are evaluated. From physical tests carried out in the laboratory, thermal energy simulations are carried out in DesignBuilder software considering a case study of a social housing project in Brazil, evaluating tropical and subtropical climates. Finally, the carbon footprint was performed, using the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology considering a cradle-to-gate scope. When compared with two conventional mortars (made of cement and hydrated lime), the bio-based earth mortar presents better thermal energy performance and a lower carbon footprint. We can conclude that there is a potential to improve the thermal energy performance in low-income housing and, at the same time, to reduce the mortar carbon footprint. This mortar can be produced where bamboo and cementitious materials are available, which is the case in several developing countries that are expected to have a substantial housing demand for new buildings in the coming years.

Abstract: The wood bio-concrete (WBC) production is a solution for the advancement of sustainable construction, since it has the potential to recycle waste in the form of shavings generated in wood processing and stock CO₂, contributing for climate change reduction. However, the chemical incompatibility between plant biomass and cementitious matrix leads to the need for previous treatment of wood shavings to application in bio-concretes. In the present study, one heat treatment and two alkaline treatments with immersion in Ca (OH)₂ solution were evaluated using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology. The environmental modeling was performed by SimaPro, using the Ecoinvent database, and primary data collected in the laboratory. The potential environmental impacts were related to the compressive strength of produced WBC (in MPa) as an ecoefficiency indicator. Considering the functional unit of mechanical performance, the alkaline treatment with two immersions was the one that generated less environmental impacts.

Abstract: The rapid development of China’s automobile industry has led to increased demand for automobile glass. Combined with the present situation of China’s automobile glass industry, life cycle assessment(LCA) method was adopted for this study, through investigating the energy consumption and emissions during the raw and auxiliary materials acquisition stage and product production stage for auto laminated glass. Then a life cycle inventory was worked out and the data was characterized and normalized by CML analysis method. The results showed that the most serious environmental impacts were Marine Aquatic Ecotoxicity Potential, abiotic depletion potential-fossil and global warming potential, whose proportion of total environmental impact was 92.2%, 2.41%, 1.75%, respectively. Further analysis showed that the influence of float glass was 36%,42% and 33.9% respectively.

Abstract: The dimension stone sector is more and more active in developing new solutions to improve the sustainability of its supply chain, partly as a consequence of the current EU policies on Circular Economy and Raw Materials. The Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a recognized scientific tool for evaluating environmental impacts of the processes. Nevertheless, in the stone sector, LCA is hindered by the scarce availability of Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) datasets for the specific processes of the stone supply chain. This paper provides LCI datasets of the most common and widespread techniques and related technologies for quarrying, cutting and finishing soft-weak stones. To this aim primary data were collected in Italian marble quarries and processing plants and in companies producing cutting tools. When necessary, industry data were complemented with secondary data from literature. High replicability and flexibility of the datasets is obtained through the provision of Unit process inventories for each technology/technique and through the set of parameters. In addition, the uncertainty of the resulting LCI datasets has been evaluated with the well-established procedure of Ecoinvent pedigree matrix. The availability of these datasets contributes to the population of Life Cycle databases and is expected to boost the measurement and enhancement of the key aspects of sustainability in the stone sector.

Abstract: In the present paper, we investigated a sandwich composite as a potential electromagnetic interference shielding wall panel for buildings. The panel was built using a ferrite-particle modified high density polyethylene in a sandwich assembly enabling electromagnetic shielding properties. The life cycle assessment (LCA) approach was employed here to assist in the production phase and in the materials selection, in order to obtain an environmental friendly final product. An optimization of the constituents of the sandwich structure is proposed by comparing the environmental impact of different potential solutions without influencing the EMI shielding properties.