Generic flowsheeting approach to obtain material and energy data for life-cycle assessment of cellulase production (submerged fermentation)

Abstract

In this paper, the outputs of a generic flowsheeting model (CeBER Bioprocess Modeller) are tested using three scenarios, against a literature study on cellulase. Further, using the outputs, an environmental assessment is performed to determine the impacts of producing 1 kg of cellulase. It is shown that the model can provide material and energy balance data with accuracy within 30% for key variables. When converted to environmental impacts (Life cycle assessment), results were typically within 20% of the literature values, but with fewer extremes, due to the lower impact of small volume chemicals that were less accurately modelled in the material data calculations. The results also show that energy and electrical inputs form the majority of the LCA impacts and should be a critical part of early-stage modelling. In future studies, the importance of reducing energy use should not be overlooked.