Data, and sample sources thereof, on water quality life cycle impact assessments pertaining to catchment scale acidification and eutrophication potentials and the benefits of on-farm mitigation strategies

Life cycle assessment is a multidisciplinary framework usually deployed to appraise the sustainability of various product or service supply-chains. Over recent decades, its use in the agri-food sector has risen sharply, and alongside this, a wide range of methodological advances have been generated. Spatial-life cycle assessment, defined in the current document as the interpretation of life cycle assessment results within a geographical nature, has not gone unexplored entirely, yet its rise as a sub-method of life cycle assessment has been rather slow relative to other avenues of research (e.g., including the nutritional sciences within life cycle assessment). With this relative methodological stagnation as a motivating factor, our paper combines a process-based model, the Catchment Systems Model, with various life cycle impact assessments (ReCiPe, Centre for Environmental Studies and Environmental Product Declaration) to propose a simple, yet effective, approach for visualising the technically feasible efficacy of various on-farm intervention strategies. As water quality was the primary focus of this study, interventions reducing acidification and eutrophication potentials of both arable and livestock farm types in the Southeast of England were considered. The study site is an area with a marked range of agricultural practices in terms of intensity. All impacts to acidification potential and eutrophication potential are reported using a functional unit of 1ha. Percentage changes relative to baseline farm types, i.e., those without any interventions, arising from various mitigation strategies, are mapped using geographical information systems. This approach demonstrates visually how a spatially-orientated life cycle assessment could provide regional-specific information for farmers and policymakers to guide the restoration of certain waterbodies. A combination of multiple mitigation strategies was found to generate the greatest reductions in pollutant losses to water, but in terms of individual interventions, optimising farm-based machinery (acidification potential) and fertiliser application strategies (eutrophication potential) were found to have notable benefits.

Globally, there is an increased interest of the Food Industry, the Politicians and the consumers to be informed about the environmental impacts connected to the production and the supply of food products.In the framework of the Paris Agreement for Climate Change and the 2030 Agenda of the United Nations for Sustainable development, the European Union (EU) has set demanding targets for the years 2030 and 2050 regarding the mitigation of environmental impacts from all its economic activities. Within this legislative context, which is expected to become stricter, the Primary Sector in Greece in general and the Livestock Production Sector more specifically are and will be obliged to contribute to the accomplishment of these goals (at country and EU level).Recent studies have highlighted the increased importance of livestock production systems regarding global environmental pollution and the discussion about implementation of strategies at the farm level for mitigation of environmental impacts has already started. Evaluating such actions on the supply chain level, allows to ensure that these actions do not cause negative environmental effects (problem shifting) to other stages of the supply chain apart from the livestock farm and eventually to the supply chain in total. To this respect, Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is considered and has been suggested as a suitable methodology for environmental impact assessment.It has to be noticed that differences in the supply chain systems and production practices of livestock products as well as differences in the climatic conditions that these systems occur, lead with high certainty in differences regarding their environmental performance. Τhere is also a lack of environmental LCA (ELCA) research which refers to Greek agricultural and livestock goods or the Food Industry. Implementation of ELCA further requires specialized scientific knowledge and the use of software for which special training is required. Thus, the access of Greek livestock farmers (but also other stakeholders of the livestock products’ supply chains) to the information that ELCA provides is almost impossible in the current conditions. Taking into consideration the aforementioned information, the goal of this PhD Research was to present the first estimates regarding the environmental performance of important livestock production systems in Greece (i.e. raw milk supply chains from dairy cattle farming and sheep and goat farming, animal live-weight supply chain from pig farming and broiler farming), by focusing on collecting data from commercial livestock farms and implementing the LCA methodology (adjusting the LCA methodology to case studies). Throughout the Thesis, focus was given on the compilation of life cycle inventories and models for the studied systems. In the case that more than one supply chain systems are involved, this research attempted to identify the reasons for variations in the environmental performance. This PhD Research further attempted to assess the effect of targeted modifications in livestock production practices (and more specifically in the rations of broiler chickens and fattening pigs) which are interesting for Greece but also on a global level, on the environmental performance of the respective supply chain systems. Within this Thesis, a discussion on how Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) technologies could be used in combination with the ELCA methodology in an effort to improve the environmental performance of a livestock product, was further initiated. Finally, in the framework of this PhD Research two easy-to-use tools for environmental impact assessment by using the LCA methodology (calculators for Greek intensive broiler and sheep and goat production processes) were developed.This PhD Thesis consists of 5 separate sections. In Section 1, an introduction to the legislative framework regarding environmental protection in the EU was presented, the importance of studying the environmental impacts of livestock systems was discussed, principles and important definitions of the ELCA methodology were given and the goals of this PhD Research were set. The rest of the sections constitute the core of this PhD research.The aim of Section 2 was to use a ‘cradle-to-farm-gate’ ELCA in order to estimate the environmental performance of the supply chain of the cow-milk produced in a dairy cattle farm located in the Region of Thessaly, Greece. The functional unit was equal to 1kg of Fat and Protein Corrected Milk (FPCM). This section also aimed to discuss a possible link between the ELCA methodology and Precision Livestock Farming technologies. The results of the Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) revealed that the enteric fermentation of cattle, the excretion and storage of manure and slurry application in ryegrass production were the most important contributing processes at the farm level to the total methane, nitrous oxide and ammonia emissions in this partial life-cycle of cow-milk. The Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) results suggested the following environmental hot spots for the studied supply chain and for the various impact categories studied (i.e. climate change, fossil fuel depletion, human and ecological toxicity, acidification, eutrophication, water depletion and land use): a) enteric fermentation of cattle, b) on-farm slurry handling, c) soybean cultivation in foreign countries (Argentina, Brazil and USA), d) domestic electricity production and e) domestic production of maize grain and silage. It is finally argued that the ELCA method could be used complementarily with PLF technologies in an effort to improve the quality of environmental impact assessment results of the supply chains of livestock products.In the context of Section 3, an experimental study was conducted to examine the combined effects of adding a dietary protease, reducing the levels of soybean meal (SBM) and introducing corn gluten meal (CGM) in the ration of a group of broilers reared on a commercial Greek farm (Region of Central Macedonia). Five hundred forty chicks were divided into three dietary treatments with six replicates of thirty birds each. The first group (Control) was fed a conventional diet based on corn and soybean meal, containing 21% w/w crude protein (CP). The second group (Soy-Prot) was supplied a corn and SBM-based diet containing a lower level of CP (20% w/w) and 200 mg of the protease RONOZYME® Proact per kg of feed. The third group (Gluten-Prot) was fed a diet without soybean-related constituents which was based on corn and CGM and with CP and protease contents identical to those of the diet of the Soy-Prot group. Body weight, feed intake and feed conversion ratio (FCR) were evaluated. Furthermore, a partial ELCA was performed in order to assess the potential environmental performance of the systems defined by these three dietary treatments and identify their environmental hot-spots. The growth performance of the broilers supplied the Soy-Prot diet was similar to the broilers supplied the Control diet. However, the broilers which were fed the Gluten-Prot diet at the end of the trial showed a tendency (P≤0.010) for lower weight gain and feed intake compared to those of the Control diet. The ELCA suggested that the ammonia and nitrous oxide emissions due to litter handling constitute the farm level hot-spots for the Acidification and Eutrophication Potentials of the Control and Soy-Prot systems and the Global Warming Potential of the Gluten-Prot system, respectively. The Latin American soybean production and domestic corn production and lignite mining are important off-farm polluting processes for the studied life cycles. The Soy-Prot and Gluten-Prot systems both performed better than the Control system in nine of Environmental Impact Category Indicators assessed, with the respective differences being generally larger for the Gluten-Prot system. The environmental impact estimates are regarded as initial, indicative figures due to their inherent uncertainty. Overall, the results could be considered as positive indications in the effort to replace the conventional, soybean-dependent control diet in the specific broiler production system in an environmentally friendly way. In Section 3, an environmental footprint calculator appropriate for the intensive broiler live-weight supply chains in Greece was further developed, based on an attributional ‘cradle-to-farm-gate’ ELCA methodology. It consists of an MS excel workbook whose user is invited to provide a number of inputs concerning the animal capital grown, its nutrition, the bedding material used, transport distances and fuel and electricity consumption. As a result, ten environmental impact category indicators (EICI’s) are estimated, among which the Acidification Potential (AP), the Eutrophication Potential (EP), the Cumulative Energy Demand (CED) and the Global Warming Potential (GWP100).In Section 4, an in situ experimental procedure was performed in order to investigate the effect of supplementing the conventional diet (CNVD) supplied to the fattening pigs of a commercial pig farm in Greece (located in Epirus Region) (based on maize, barley, wheat bran and soybean meal) with 0.4% w/w attapulgite and 0.5% w/w benzoic acid at the expense of maize (ATTBAD diet) on their feed efficiency and growth performance. The results suggested a significant increase (p≤0.05) in the weight gain (TWG) and the slaughter live-weight and a significant decrease (p≤0.05) in the feed intake (FI) and feed conversion ratio per fattening pig when supplied the ATTBAD. These results were further used as an input to a ‘cradle-to-farm-gate’ environmental Life Cycle Assessment (ELCA). The functional unit (FU) was 1 kg of sold pig live-weight and the environmental impact categories (EICs) assessed were climate change (CC) and CC from direct land use change, acidification, eutrophication, land use, water use and fossil energy use. The indicators for all EICs (EICIs) were

Feeding a growing, increasingly affluent population while limiting environmental pressures of food production is a central challenge for society. Understanding the location and magnitude of food production is key to addressing this challenge because pressures vary substantially across food production types. Applying data and models from life cycle assessment with the methodologies for mapping cumulative environmental impacts of human activities (hereafter cumulative impact mapping) provides a powerful approach to spatially map the cumulative environmental pressure of food production in a way that is consistent and comprehensive across food types. However, these methodologies have yet to be combined. By synthesizing life cycle assessment and cumulative impact mapping methodologies, we provide guidance for comprehensively and cumulatively mapping the environmental pressures (e.g., greenhouse gas emissions, spatial occupancy, and freshwater use) associated with food production systems. This spatial approach enables quantification of current and potential future environmental pressures, which is needed for decision makers to create more sustainable food policies and practices.

Environmental impacts and attendant nuisance of solid wastes escalate in the 21st Century. Effective management of the wastes in a holistic manner is a proven way out of the menace. This research focuses on accessing the life cycle of solid wastes in Osogbo. The main objective is to evaluate the physical and chemical constituents of the wastes and determine their best disposal method in the study area. In the study, wastes were collected over a period of 2 weeks, wastes composition was determined for the randomly selected residential buildings, and the per capital waste generation rate was evaluated for the area. Potable gas detectors were used to detect and measure the gases present at this dumpsite. The emission of gases and energy consumption was evaluated using the methodology of life cycle in calculating life cycle inventory of the waste strategies. The measured gases include; Sulphur (IV) oxide (SO2), carbon monoxide (CO), carbon (iv) oxide (CO2), ammonia (NH4). The Tool for the Reduction and Assessment of Chemical and other Environmental Impacts (TRACI) of the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the Methodology of the Centre for Environmental Studies (CML) of the University of Leiden are the two approaches applied as provided for in the GaBi6 (Holistic Balancing) Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) software database, to classify and characterize environmental impacts of municipal wastes in Osogbo. The Impact Indices measured from both scenarios were: Global Warming Potential (GWP), Acidification Potential (AP), Eutrophication Potential (EP) and Ozone Layer Depletion Potential (ODP). For the Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA), two waste management scenarios were developed and compared using GaBi6 software. Scenario one involves collection, transportation and incineration, while Scenario 2 ends with landfilling. Findings showed that the overall mean percent (%) wastes composition for paper, biodegradable, plastic, glass, metal, wood and textile were respectively found to be 4.32, 67.53, 5.07, 4.90, 6.54, 8.74 and 2.90. The per capita waste generation in the study area was found to be 1.09 kg/capita/day. From the results of LCIA methods studied using the ODP index, Scenario one with the TRACI method gives the total values for GWP, AP, EP, ODP as 4.18, 1.08, 1.392E-4, 3.147E-8 respectively. With the CML method, the values are 4.18, 1.3E-3, 3.771E-4, 2.878E-8 respectively. The respective results from scenario two with the TRACI method and CML methods showed total values for GWP, AP, EP, ODP as 9.64, 0.112, 3.108E-3, 1.447E-11 and 9.64, 1.77E-3, 7.247E-3, 1.361E-11. It is concluded that of the two management scenarios considered, landfilling of wastes is more environmentally friendly as compared to incineration, and is therefore recommended for use in the study area.

The life cycle assessment of a solar-assisted absorption chilling system in Bangkok, Thailand

Comparison of different methods for consideration of multifunctionality of Peruvian dairy cattle in Life Cycle Assessment

Dairy processing industry is one of the industries that give positive contribution to the economic growth, however it also contributes in many impacts on the environment, as well as milk powder product manufactured by PT X. The main objective of this study was to determine the most significant environmental impact caused by production and transportation of milk powder in bag 250 gram (Product X) using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology. The boundary of the LCA study is “cradle to gate”, including: materials production, materials transportation from supplier to the PT X factory, manufacture of milk powder in PT X, and distribution of the products from factory to distributor. Four impact categories will be calculated on this study: global warming potential (GWP), eutrophication potential (EP), acidification potential (AP), and photochemical oxidant creation potential (POCP). The impact assessment was calculated by software SimaPro v.8.3.2 faculty license, and the calculation result validated manually by Microsoft Excel. The result of environmental impact calculation showed the GWP, EP, AP, and POCP of 1 kg milk powder is 1.3245 kg CO2 eq/kg, 0.0033 kg PO43- eq/kg, 0.0066 kg SO2 eq/kg and 0.0020 kg C2H4 eq/kg. The material production subsystem has the highest environmental impact on GWP, POCP, AP and EP categories. In particular, production activity in PT X also contributes to GWP. An environmental impact reduction strategy can focus on reducing GWP with electricity usage efficiency and developing a material supplier selection plan with environmental impacts of material production as one of criteria.

In 2013 the population of dairy cattle in Indonesia had reached 636,000 head with a 4.61% growth rate per year. The inputs were energy, water, and feed. These inputs produced outputs, such as emissions, solid waste and liquid waste. This research compared the maintenance systems in modern farms and local farms. The data were collected from 30 local farmers and one modern farm. This research used the life cycle assessment (LCA) method. LCA is based on ISO 14040. LCA consists of several stages: the goal and scope definition, inventory analysis, impact assessment, and interpretation. This research used the cradle to gate concept and fat corrected milk (FCM) as the function unit. The impacts of these activities could generate global warming potential (GWP), acidification potential (AP), and eutrophication potential (EP). The calculations showed that the systems in local farms had the greatest emissions result over all impacts. In the case of local farms, the GWP was 2.34 kg CO2 eq/L of milk FCM, AP was 0.12 g SO2 eq/L of milk FCM, and EP was 18.28 g PO43- $P{O_{\rm{4}}}^{{\rm{3}} - }$ eq/L milk FCM. While the impact from the modern farm was GWP of 1.52 kg CO2 eq/L of milk FCM, AP of 0.02 g SO2 eq/L of milk FCM, and EP of 0.353 g PO43- $P{O_{\rm{4}}}^{{\rm{3}} - }$ eq/L of milk FCM. Based on the total-weighted result, the GWP had the greatest impact from the overall life cycle phase of milk production. The total-weighted result obtained was of 0.298 EUR/L of FCM from a local farm and 0.189 EUR/L of FCM from the modern farm. This amount could be used to remediate the global warming, acidification, and eutrophication impacts of milk production.

This paper aims to evaluate and quantify the energy consumption and environmental emissions of a refrigeration compressor produced by a Chinese factory throughout the entire compressor life cycle and try to determine the stage with the strongest environmental impact. The study covers all relevant life cycle stages, from raw material production to compressor use and final disposal. The research is conducted in accordance with ISO 14040/14044 standards. Life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology is applied in this study, and Chinese Life Cycle Database is used for the assessment. The evaluation results are presented in terms of individual impact category according to the characterization model (CML 2001) and normalization references (Laurent et al. 16:401–409, 2011). The following seven impact categories are considered: global warming potential, acidification potential, eutrophication potential, photochemical ozone formation potential, ozone depletion potential, ecotoxicity, and primary energy demand. All necessary energy and material flows are detailed for assessment purposes. LCA results show that the compressor use stage in the life cycle consumes the most energy and exerts the strongest environmental impact, followed by the stages of raw material production and component manufacturing. Meanwhile, primary energy demand, ecotoxicity, and global warming potential are three predominant impact categories along with the entire life cycle of the refrigeration compressor; which account for 36.2150, 34.4567, and 16.5862 % of total impacts, respectively. Results show that the compressor use stage may be improved given that environmental impact is largely influenced by electricity requirement. Further investigation must be conducted to improve compressor service efficiency.

Life cycle assessment of the comprehensive utilisation of vanadium titano-magnetite

Circular utilization of urban tree waste contributes to the mitigation of climate change and eutrophication

Source-separation systems for urban wastewater management collect the different wastewater flows separately to facilitate the recovery of valuable resources from wastewater (energy, nutrients). Thus, they are claimed to be more sustainable than the conventional concept of combined drainage and treatment. This hypothesis is verified in this study by comparing the environmental impacts of conventional and sourceseparation systems with the methodology of Life Cycle Assessment (ISO 14040/44). In a hypothetical case study for an urban area (5000 inhabitants), twelve different scenarios for the integrated management of household wastewater and biowaste are set up in a substance flow model. Required inventory data for all relevant core processes of wastewater collection and treatment is compiled from pilot projects and literature and is complemented by qualified assumptions. Secondary functions of separation systems (supply of energy and nutrients) are considered by expanding the conventional system with the respective production processes for grid energy and mineral fertilizer. Resource demand and emissions are aggregated for each scenario and evaluated in Life Cycle Impact Assessment with a set of eight indicators for energy and resource demand, global warming, eutrophication, acidification, and human and ecotoxicity. Results of the impact assessment show that separation systems offer significant potentials for an increase in sustainability. Recovering energy from the organic matter of toilet wastewater and especially biowaste in a digestion process can decrease the cumulative energy demand by up to 40% and related emissions of greenhouse gases by up to 46%. Energetic benefits of mineral fertilizer substitution are relatively low, but the quality of organic fertilizers from urine and faeces is superior to mineral fertilizer or sewage sludge in terms of lower heavy metal content. The remaining greywater can be treated in an activated sludge process with less energy demand and better effluent quality than in the conventional system. Natural treatment in soil filters can further reduce the energy demand considerably, but the insufficient retention of phosphorus in soil filters can seriously increase the eutrophication potential by up to 140%. Greywater can also be adequately treated for non-potable reuse with membrane bioreactors, although the energetic benefits of wastewater reuse are marginal. During the application of liquid organic fertilizers from urine and faeces, increased emissions of ammonia lead to a higher potential for acidification (+ 60-110%) and should be minimized by adequate application techniques. Overall, grouping and weighting of the indicators reveal significant benefits in ecological sustainability for separation systems. However, the choice of an appropriate combination of process technology for separation systems is essential for a realization of these potential benefits, because the conventional system has already been optimized in terms of energy demand and effluent quality. In sensitivity analysis, decisive key parameters of the inventory are identified. Functional definitions and the choice of both indicators for impact assessment and valuation methods can have a considerable impact on the results of this LCA.

Comparative assessment of the environmental impacts of nuclear, wind and hydro-electric power plants in Ontario: A life cycle assessment

Canned pineapple products have great potential for Indonesia’s export and agricultural sectors. The purpose of this research is to conduct the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of canned pineapple products and to determine how to reduce their environmental impacts. The LCA method comprises goal and scope definition, inventory analysis, impact analysis, and interpretation stages. The scope of this research is gate-to-gate and covers the entire pineapple production process, starting from the arrival of raw materials at the production gate and ending with the final product from the factory. Environmental impacts are focused on global warming potential (GWP), acidification potential (AP), and eutrophication potential (EP). The findings identified various inputs and outputs in the canned pineapple production process, including pineapple raw materials, electrical energy, packaging, waste, and emissions. The functional unit (FU) of canned pineapple is 0.5873 kg/can, and it shows three environmental impacts as follows: GWP at 5.14E-02 kg-CO 2- eq/kg-canned pineapple, AP at 2.62E-04 kg-SO 2 -eq/kg-canned pineapple, and EP at 2.01E-04 kg-PO 3 4 -eq/kg-canned pineapple. The main emissions come from thermal power plants in factories, so improvements are proposed by renewable energy sources, such as solar photovoltaic (SPV), which achieves a reduction of 71.78% GWP, 67.94% AP, and 93.24% EP. The substitution of sub-bituminous coal with anthracite reduced 75.29% GWP and 73.48% AP but increased 88.66% EP. Coal substitution to Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) reduced 16.79% AP and 94.49% EP but increased 44.69% GWP. The utilization of solid waste for juice production can reduce 98.91% GWP, 97.53% AP, and 97.13% EP. The utilization of liquid waste as biogas can reduce 70.92% GWP, 96.12% AP, and 95.1% EP. Substituting renewable energy from SPVs and utilizing wastewater or solid wastes can reduce the environmental impacts of GWP, AP, and EP compared to substituting bituminous coal with anthracite or LNG. Keywords: acidification, eutrophication, global warming potential, life cycle assessment, pineapple processing. https://doi.org/10.55463/issn.1674-2974.51.6.20

The energy consumption and emission of polyurethane pavement construction based on life cycle assessment