Abstract
The main purpose of this article is to assess the environmental impacts associated with the fishing operations related to European anchovy fishing in Cantabria (northern Spain) under a life cycle approach. The life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology was applied for this case study including construction, maintenance, use, and end of life of the vessels. The functional unit used was 1 kg of landed round anchovy at port. Inventory data were collected for the main inputs and outputs of 32 vessels, representing a majority of vessels in the fleet. Results indicated, in a similar line to what is reported in the literature, that the production, transportation, and use of diesel were the main environmental hot spots in conventional impact categories. Moreover, in this case, the production and transportation of seine nets was also relevant. Impacts linked to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions suggest that emissions were in the upper range for fishing species captured with seine nets and the value of global warming potential (GWP) was 1.44 kg CO2 eq per functional unit. The ecotoxicity impacts were mainly due to the emissions of antifouling substances to the ocean. Regarding fishery-specific categories, many were discarded given the lack of detailed stock assessments for this fishery. Hence, only the biotic resource use category was computed, demonstrating that the ecosystems’ effort to sustain the fishery is relatively low. The use of the LCA methodology allowed identifying the main environmental hot spots of the purse seining fleet targeting European anchovy in Cantabria. Individualized results per port or per vessel suggested that there are significant differences in GHG emissions between groups. In addition, fuel use is high when compared to similar fisheries. Therefore, research needs to be undertaken to identify why fuel use is so high, particularly if it is related to biomass and fisheries management or if skipper decisions could play a role.
Highlights
Seafood is increasingly recognized as playing an important role in terms of food supply and security worldwide
The sampling of the purse seining vessels fulfilled PAS 2050-2 (PAS 2050-2, 2012) requirements specific to seafood and other aquatic food products. The goal of this Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) study was to assess the environmental impacts associated with the fishing activity of European anchovy landings by the Cantabrian purse seining fleet
Vessel use dominated the contribution to photochemical oxidant formation (POF) (3.07⋅10-2 kg NMVOC eq), Particulate matter formation (PMF) (1.09⋅10-2 kg PM10 eq), acidification potential (AP) (2.79⋅10-2 kg SO2 eq), Global Warming Potential (GWP) (1.32 kg CO2 eq), fossil depletion (FD) (4.35⋅10-1 kg oil eq), EU (3.83⋅10-3 kg PO43- eq), water depletion (WD) (2.29⋅10-3 m3) and freshwater eco-toxicity FEP (3.48⋅10+1 CTUe)
Summary
Seafood is increasingly recognized as playing an important role in terms of food supply and security worldwide. The beneficial effect of fish consumption on human health has been related to the high content of n-3 fatty acids, and it has been a recurring policy strategy to foster direct human consumption (Zlatanos and Laskaridis 2007). In this context, according to Zlatanos and Sagredos (1993), anchovy species are among the best sources of n-3 fatty acids. Population levels depend strongly on the incoming year-class strength, which is highly variable and largely dependent on environmental factors (Fréon et al 2005)
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