Emission Footprint Research Articles

Complementary roles for mechanical and solvent-based recycling in low-carbon, circular polypropylene.

Plastic recycling presents a vexing challenge. Mechanical recycling offers substantial greenhouse gas emissions savings relative to virgin plastic production but suffers from degraded aesthetic and mechanical properties. Polypropylene, one of the most widely used and lowest-cost plastics, features methyl pendants along the polymer backbone, rendering it particularly susceptible to declining properties, performance, and aesthetics across a succession of mechanical recycles. Advanced processes, such as solvent-assisted recycling, promise near-virgin quality outputs at a greater energy and emissions footprint. Mechanical and advanced recycling are often presented as competing options, but real-world plastic waste streams are likely to require preprocessing regardless of whether they are routed to an advanced process. This study quantifies the life-cycle greenhouse gas implications of multiple recycling strategies and proposes a system in which mechanical and solvent-assisted recycling can be leveraged together to boost recycling rates and satisfy demand for a wider range of product applications. Polypropylene can be recovered from mixed-plastic bales produced at material recovery facilities and processed through mechanical recycling, with a varying fraction sent for further upgrading via solvent-assisted recycling to produce material approved for food packaging and other higher-quality applications. The resulting mechanically recycled rigid polypropylene reduces life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions by 80% relative to the same quantity of virgin material, while the upgraded higher-quality material achieves GHG savings of 30%.

Spectroscopic investigation of diesel-piloted ammonia spray combustion

This work investigates the flame emissions of diesel-piloted ammonia spray combustion under conditions relevant to internal combustion engines. Due to ammonia’s carbon-free structure, its flame emissions differ significantly from carbon-containing fuels. This work provides new insights into the combustion process by distinguishing pilot and main fuel combustion by analyzing spectrally resolved flame emission footprints between 275nm and 750nm in a rapid compression expansion machine (RCEM). Additional results based on Shadowgraphy (SG), OH*-chemiluminescence (CL), visible natural flame luminosity (NL) imaging, and heat release rate (HRR) analysis describe the combustion process in detail. OH*, NH*, NH2*, as well as broadband CL from NH2*, NO2*, and H2O* contribute to ammonia flame luminosity. The results show that the combustion process encompasses a pilot ignition phase, a flame transition phase, and an ammonia combustion phase, during which only ammonia-related flame emissions occur and the main share of heat is released. Background corrected OH*, NH*, and NH2* intensities reveal the evolution of individual contributions to the flame emissions. NH2*-CL is the main contributor to visible ammonia flame emissions under the conditions investigated. Therefore, visible flame emissions are a suitable indicator for the flame front during the ammonia combustion phase.

The dynamic impact assessment of clean energy and green innovation in realizing environmental sustainability of G‐20

AbstractIn the context of the growth and development process, stability in environmental quality has remained a challenging issue to sustainable development, as several environmental problems, such as climate conditions, anthropogenic global warming, deforestation, and escalating degradation of water and air quality, depict a rising trend. In the contemporary materialistic paradigm, attaining a high economic growth rate while ensuring sustainable consumption of natural resources is impossible. The world needs to attain an economic growth rate that confirms sustainability in natural resource consumption and exploitation of resources introduced severe alert about the sustainability of such trajectory progress as an increase in economic growth upsurges natural reserve usage and energy demand, which leads to environmental deprivation. Both theoretical and empirical literature support that green or clean energy sources could significantly sustain environmental quality and foster economic growth. The recent literature assessed the role of green technology in promoting environmental sustainability. It emphasizes that green innovations are the most competent method to carry the competent use of resources, thereby reducing environmental degradation. Therefore, the main aim of this study is to analyze the impact of economic growth, clean energy, technological innovations, natural resources depletion, and green and sustainable technology on the environmental degradation of G‐20 nations in the frame spanning from 1992 to 2018. The results of cross‐sectional‐autoregressive‐distributed lag (CS‐ARDL) model estimation indicate the presence of a long‐run association between economic growth, number of filled applications for patents, development of environment‐related technologies as a percentage of all technologies, natural resources rents (NRR) as a percentage of GDP, renewable energy consumption, trade openness and environment degradation of G‐20 nations. This study re‐confirmed the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis for selected nations. Further, the study's findings revealed that cleaner energy and technological innovations, mainly green technology, play a significant role in sustaining the environmental conditions of these selected countries. Moreover, the degree of natural resource depletion directly impacts environmental degradation (CO₂ emission, total greenhouse gases emission and ecological footprints) in selected nations. The study underscores the importance of promoting clean energy, green technology, and sustainable practices to balance economic growth and environmental preservation and provides policymakers in G‐20 nations with valuable policy recommendations.

Comparative Performance and Energy Efficiency Analysis of JVM Variants and GraalVM in Java Applications

Java has dominated the ICT market for almost thirty years with various applications in nearly every sector all over the world. One of Java's main drawbacks comes from its heavyweight core - the Java Virtual Machine (JVM). Therefore, several JVM distributions have been developed to address this issue. GraalVM is the most promising amongst the recent distributions, providing better performance, low power consumption, and reduced carbon footprint emissions. In this research, a comparative analysis based on performance and energy efficiency metrics was conducted to assess this JVM distribution in light of three other classic JVM distributions: Amazon Corretto, Adopt OpenJDK, and Zulu. Findings showed that, although there was no significant difference between the test candidates, GraalVM seemed to be the leading JVM distribution. It is recommended that programmers and technology businesses consider adopting GraalVM in their future Java applications because of its energy efficiency.

A Framework of Vehicle Usage Optimization for Tour Purposes

Nowadays, people like to travel to alleviate the stress and depression they experience in their busy lives, and if they can do so at a low cost, it will be even more beneficial to them. A traveler can choose to book a travel ticket themselves or to contact a travel agency, who will book a ticket for them. A lack of vehicle management can cause travel agencies to lose profit. In this article, we have provided proficient solutions for vehicle optimization to minimize travel costs. Additionally, however, arranging an appropriate tour guide is sometimes expensive for travelers. Moreover, travelers often do not know about suitable travel packages and occasionally do not know where they may want to visit. In this paper, we have discussed how we used effective methods to reduce vehicle costs for tour purposes. Furthermore, an optimal bus seat occupancy solution has been developed, incorporating the package system and including a tour guide. Our system offers a remedy by providing access to cost-effective packages. We have also added a blog portal to our web-based software for an overview all tourist places and their information. As a result, we have found optimized routes and provide low-cost, high-value tours. We have also reduced carbon footprint emissions. Our proposed optimal vehicle usage system has been developed using Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), the Tailwind Framework, React, and Node.js.

Techno-economic and life cycle assessment of the integration of bioenergy with carbon capture and storage in the polygeneration system (BECCS-PS) for producing green electricity and methanol

Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) has the potential to produce negative emissions. This study assessed the overall energy efficiency and carbon dioxide (CO2) avoidance costs and emission footprint following the integration of BECCS with a polygeneration system (BECCS-PS) for the co-production of green electricity and methanol. The process was simulated in Aspen Plus and Aspen HYSYS v.11. Oil palm empty fruit bunches were used as the feed in a biomass integrated gasification combined cycle power plant. The flue gas, which contained CO2, was captured for methanol synthesis and carbon storage. Green hydrogen for use in methanol synthesis was produced through proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolysis powered by solar PV (PV-PEM) and geothermal power with double-flash technology (GEO-PEM). The environmental impacts of the process were investigated by a life cycle assessment and the economic aspects were evaluated using the levelized cost method. The overall system efficiency was higher in the PV-PEM scenario than in the GEO-PEM scenario. For any production capacities, the green electricity generated from the BECCS-PS plant resulted in negative emissions. A biomass power plant with a low production capacity generated higher production and CO2 avoidance costs than that with a larger production capacity. The CO2 − eq emissions and costs for methanol production in the PV-PEM scenario were larger than those in the GEO-PEM scenario, with values of -0.83 to -0.70 kg CO2 − eq/kg MeOH and 1,191–1,237 USD/ton, respectively. The corresponding values were − 1.65 to -1.52 kg CO2 − eq/kg MeOH and 918–961 USD/ton, respectively, for the GEO-PEM scenario.Graphical

Collision avoidance of autonomous ships in inland waterways – A survey and open research problems

Promoting autonomous surface ships in inland waterways traffic (IWT) is a potential solution towards reducing road traffic and transport emission footprints. Over the last decade, there has been a growing research on autonomous ships for open waters. However, applying this research to the IWT domain is not straightforward. The IWT, due to its confined waterways, poses a different challenge than the open sea case. Due to the confined waterways, inland ships face several hydrodynamic phenomena that they rarely encountered in the open sea, such as shallow water, banks, or ship-to-ship effects. Furthermore, the higher traffic density in inland waterways also requires a different solution for sensing and control systems.This paper offers an overview of the current developments on autonomous collision avoidance for inland waterway ships that covering different problems of safety navigation for ship in IWT. A short analysis is presented to highlight the strengths and weaknesses of each approach. We also discuss the current research gaps and what could be improved to enable the operation of inland autonomous ships.

Do industrialization and nonrenewable energy affect environmental quality? Evidence from top fossil fuel-consuming countries.

The global warming phenomenon has been an issue of considerable discussion and debate among academics and decision-makers over the past few decades. Therefore, a deeper comprehension of the relationships between environmental deterioration and its causes is necessary in nations that rely on fossil fuels. This study examines the relationship between per capita carbon dioxide emissions and total natural resources, nonrenewable energy, industrialization, and ecological footprint from 2001 to 2020 in the case of major fossil fuel-consuming countries. The most recent panel Granger causality and panel-corrected standard error (PCSE) simulation models are used in this study. The findings indicate that natural resources, ecological footprint, and registered companies impede environmental quality. Similarly, the same results were noted by employing the generalized least square method. A feedback effect was noted between carbon dioxide emission and ecological footprint, while unidirectional causality between coal consumption and carbon emission. In light of these findings, it is advised that instead of pursuing policies that encourage the use of coal and petroleum, new energy policies enhance the share of nonfossil fuels in the energy mix for controlling rapid industrialization, extraction of natural resources, and environmental and economic issues.

Evaluation of asphalt pavement maintenance using recycled asphalt pavement with asphalt binders

Road maintenance projects require innovative, economical, and environmental solutions. This study evaluated recycled asphalt pavement (RAP) as a greener aggregate alternative to natural aggregate for the maintenance of asphalt concrete in flexible pavements. The mechanistic performance of warm mix and cold mix asphalt concretes using recycled asphalt pavement (RAP) was furthermore investigated in this study. The bitumen binders used were asphalt cement AC60/70 for warm mix asphalt concrete and asphalt emulsion CMS-2 h for cold mix asphalt concrete. Laboratory tests undertaken include Marshall stability and flow, indirect tensile strength, indirect resilient modulus, indirect tensile fatigue, and permanent deformation were performed to ascertain the true performance of RAP-AC60/70 and RAP-CMS-2 h mixtures as maintenance asphalt concretes. The laboratory test results of RAP-AC60/70 and RAP-CMS-2 h mixtures were compared with those of a conventional warm mix asphalt concrete using limestone and asphalt cement AC60/70. The results indicated that the overall performance of both RAP-AC60/70 and RAP-CMS-2 h mixtures was comparable to the Limestone-AC60/70 mixtures. The total material cost of RAP-60/70 and RAP-CMS-2 h mixtures was approximately 60% lower than Limestone-AC60/70 mixture. However, the RAP-CMS-2 h mixture had more advantages than RAP-60/70 in terms of maintenance operation and carbon footprint emission. The usage of RAP with both CMS-2 h for repairing pavement deterioration was found to provide a more cost-effective and greener solution.

ArtEMon: Artificial Intelligence and Internet of Things Powered Greenhouse Gas Sensing for Real-Time Emissions Monitoring.

Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reporting and sustainability are increasingly important for businesses around the world. Yet the lack of a single standardised method of measurement, when coupled with an inability to understand the true state of emissions in complex logistics activities, presents enormous barriers for businesses to understanding the extent of their emissions footprint. One of the traditional approaches to accurately capturing and monitoring gas emissions in logistics is through using gas sensors. However, connecting, maintaining, and operating gas sensors on moving vehicles in different road and weather conditions is a large and costly challenge. This paper presents the development and evaluation of a reliable and accurate sensing technique for GHG emissions collection (or monitoring) in real-time, employing the Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to eliminate or reduce the usage of gas sensors, using reliable and cost-effective solutions.

High Intra‐Seasonal Variability in Greenhouse Gas Emissions From Temperate Constructed Ponds

AbstractInland waters play a major role in global greenhouse gas (GHG) budgets. The smallest of these systems (i.e., ponds) have a particularly large—but poorly constrained—emissions footprint at the global scale. Much of this uncertainty is due to a poor understanding of temporal variability in emissions. Here, we conducted high‐resolution temporal sampling to quantify GHG exchange between four temperate constructed ponds and the atmosphere on an annual basis. We show these ponds are a net source of GHGs to the atmosphere (564.4 g CO2‐eq m−2 yr−1), driven by highly temporally variable diffusive methane (CH4) emissions. Diffusive CH4 release to the atmosphere was twice as high during periods when the ponds had a stratified water column than when it was mixed. Ebullitive CH4 release was also higher during stratification. Building ponds to favor mixed conditions thus presents an opportunity to minimize the global GHG footprint of future pond construction.

Bioenergy recovery and carbon emissions benefits of short-term bio-thermophilic pretreatment on low organic sewage sludge anaerobic digestion: A pilot-scale study

Sewage sludge in cities of Yangzi River Belt, China, generally exhibits a lower organic content and higher silt contentdue to leakage of drainage system, which caused low bioenergy recovery and carbon emission benefits in conventional anaerobic digestion (CAD). Therefore, this paper is on a pilot scale, a bio-thermophilic pretreatment anaerobic digestion (BTPAD) for low organic sludge (volatile solids (VS) of 4%) was operated with a long-term continuous flow of 200 days. The VS degradation rate and CH4 yield of BTPAD increased by 19.93% and 53.33%, respectively, compared to those of CAD. The analysis of organic compositions in sludge revealed that BTPAD mainly improved the hydrolysis of proteins in sludge. Further analysis of microbial community proportions by high-throughput sequencing revealed that the short-term bio-thermophilic pretreatment was enriched in Clostridiales, Coprothermobacter and Gelria, was capable of hydrolyzing acidified proteins, and provided more volatile fatty acid (VFA) for the subsequent reaction. Biome combined with fluorescence quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) analysis showed that the number of bacteria with high methanogenic capacity in BTPAD was much higher than that in CAD during the medium temperature digestion stage, indicating that short-term bio-thermophilic pretreatment could provide better methanogenic conditions for BTPAD. Furthermore, the greenhouse gas emission footprint analysis showed that short-term bio-thermophilic pretreatment could reduce the carbon emission of sludge anaerobic digestion system by 19.18%.

Exploring the Intertwined Nexus between Globalization, Energy Usage, Economic Complexity, and Environmental Quality in Emerging Asian Economies: APathway Towards a Greener Future.

The study aims to examine the relationship between carbon emissions and ecological footprints with economic complexity, core pollution indicators, urbanization, globalization, and renewable and non-renewable energy consumption in eight emerging Asian economies from 1971 to 2020. A panel data framework that considers cross-sectional dependence and heterogeneity was used for analysis. The Pedroni and Johnsen Fisher cointegration showed that carbon emission, ecological footprint, renewable and non-renewable energy consumption, economic complexity, globalization, and urbanization confirmed the presence of cointegration. Moreover, fully modified ordinary least squares (FMOLS) and dynamic ordinary least squares (DLOS) indicated that globalization, non-renewable energy consumption, and economic complexity increase emission and ecological footprint in the long run, whereas renewable energy generated through biomass, solar, and wind decreases environmental degradation. Furthermore, urbanization also negatively affects the environment. From a policy perspective, policymakers in these countries may manage their natural resources efficiently by escalating the share of renewables in total energy production, offering tax holidays, incentives and encouraging companies to install clean energy plant, and providing support to research and development-oriented companies to engage in research activities to reduce the cost of production of renewable energy.

Chemically mediated asphalt rejuvenation via epoxidized vegetable oil derivatives for sustainable pavements

Here we report the chemical passivation of agglomerated asphaltenes in low-quality asphalts and reclaimed asphalt pavement via epoxidized vegetable oil derivatives. This facilitates the production of new pavements with 45 wt% recycled content and a 30% reduction in cost, energy, and emissions impact over current best practices. Recycled asphalt pavement and low-quality asphalt both represent materials streams with the potential to drastically reduce the energy and emissions footprint of our transportation infrastructure, provided that their poor performance properties can be ameliorated. We show that epoxidized methyl soyate and sub-epoxidized soybean oil act as chemical rejuvenators that reduce the asphaltene content in binder formulations enabling both low-quality asphalt and recycled asphalt pavement fractions far exceeding common usage. We demonstrate that compared to “fluxes”, or inert diluents, these bio-based additives show far superior solvency, rheological characteristics, and resistance to cracking as evidenced by both lab-based binder studies and a full-scale demonstration paving project.

Assessment of hydrogen gas turbine-fuel cell powerplant for rotorcraft

Conventional turboshaft engines are high power density movers suffering from low efficiency at part power operation and producing significant emissions. This paper presents a design exploration and feasibility assessment of a hybrid hydrogen-fueled powerplant for Urban Air Mobility (UAM) rotorcraft. A multi-disciplinary approach is devised comprising models for rotorcraft performance, tank and subsystems sizing and engine performance. The respective trade-offs between payload-range and mission level performance are quantified for kerosene-fueled and hybrid hydrogen tilt-rotor variants. The effects of gas turbine scaling and fuel cell pressurization are evaluated for different hybridization degrees. Gas turbine scaling with hybridization (towards the fuel cell) results in up to 21% benefit in energy consumption relative to the non-scaled case with the benefits being more pronounced at high hybridization degrees. Pressurizing the fuel cell has shown significant potential as cell efficiency can increase up to 10% when pressurized to 6 bar which translates to a 6% increase in overall efficiency. The results indicate that current fuel cells (1 kW/kg) combined with current hydrogen tank technology severely limit the payload-range capability of the tilt-rotor. However, for advanced fuel cell technology (2.5 kW/kg) and low ranges, hybrid powerplant show the potential to reduce energy consumption and reduce emissions footprint.

A fishing route optimization decision support system: The case of the tuna purse seiner

Fisheries face challenges in improving efficiency and reducing their emission footprint and operating costs. Decision support systems offer an opportunity to tackle such challenges. This study focuses on the dynamic fishing routing problem (DFRP) of a tuna purse seiner from a tactical and operational routing point of view. The tactical routing problem is formalized as the dynamic k-travelling salesperson problem with moving targets and time windows, whereas the operational problem is formulated as the time-dependent shortest path problem. The algorithm proposed to solve this problem, called GA-TDA*, couples a genetic algorithm (GA), which uses problem-dependent operators, with a time-dependent A* algorithm. Using real data from a fishing company, the designed GA crossovers were evaluated along with the trade-off between the combination of the proposed objectives: fuel consumption and probability of high catches. The DFRP was also solved as a real dynamic problem with route updates every time a dFAD was fished. The results obtained by this approach were compared with historical fishing trips, where a potential saving in fuel consumption and time at sea of around 57% and 33%, respectively were shown. The dynamic GA-TDA* shows that a better selection of fishing grounds together with considerations about weather conditions can help industry to mitigate and adapt to climate change while decreasing one of their main operational costs.

Utilization of Aerial Drone Technology in Logistics

In order to create a supply chain that is both economically and ecologically sustainable and complies with contemporary standards, the logistics chain must be modernized and should rely on new technology. In this article, the authors will attempt to elaborate the development direction of delivery systems through examples of technology-oriented companies such as Amazon, focusing on the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) for delivering smaller packages within urban and suburban environments. The main goal of using drones in urban logistics is to reduce the burden on city roads and the use of road vehicles that generate the highest gaseous emissions footprint. The use of drones has proven to be extremely flexible and useful in port logistics as well, eliminating the need to send supply vessels into rough seas or putting people in danger during exhaust emission control. However, drones are a relatively new technology, and they have their own limitations, which are still being discovered. The main constraints of the devices themselves are power sources and the power of the aircraft, which currently and likely in the future won’t be able to transport heavier commercial loads. Increased use leads to congestion in airspace, posing risks to other modes of transportation such as road or air. Research shows that the current use of drones mainly revolves around test flights or limited applications within a regulated environment.

THE CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES IN ADAPTATION OF GREEN BUILDING RATING SYSTEM IN NEPAL

Nepal especially Kathmandu Valley is highly rich in huge number of residences and users from all over the country which is major source of increasing Greenhouse Gas emission and CO2 footprints. Haphazardly mushrooming concrete jungle without proper planning, environmental consciousness and future vision is the big, alarming sign of degradation of its beauty and environment. Nepal is leading towards "grey rather than green". Electricity consumption growing rate of approximately 10% per year and the total energy consumption at a rate of 2.4% per year is in increasing order. At present context, the depletion of energy resources and the risk of climate change is demanding for a sustainable development path based on renewable energies and energy efficiency. Therefore, incorporating green features in buildings can substantially save energy, water consumption, and reduce GHG emissions. Green Building Rating System provides framework for healthy, efficient, carbon and cost saving green buildings. It helps the building industry to move toward sustainable development and enhances performance, durability, aesthetic, and sustainability of built environment. In many developed and developing countries, there is a minimum mandatory rule for rating system. Rating of building helps user to know and aware about how much his/ her houses consume energy and reduce; not only energy consumption but also reduces the energy expenses. The knowledge about energy efficiency, green building, green features, design parameters and Green Building Rating System is very low among the general public and most of the technical persons and is the reason why still Green Building Rating System is still not implemented in Nepal. There is a very low demand of Green Building Rating system in Nepal due to the lack of awareness both social and cultural. Lack of education, lack of proper and mandatory green building related guidelines and lack of skilled manpower and technology are the major challenges. Group of renowned Architects and experts of Nepal were involved and tried their best with green building projects to register under LEED certification but was failure to get the certificate. Additionally, draft of ERA guidelines (preliminary) prepared by the group of pioneer Architects of Nepal was the initiation towards establishment of own building rating system in Nepal. Green Building Rating System will be the solution for energy optimization and will mark a turning point for the green design and green movement in building industry in Nepal.

Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) Model Feedstock Selection on Producing the Sustainable Aviation Fuel

Global energy business is shifting towards more sustainable alternatives fuels due to climate change issue. Countries, companies, and associations start to adopt energy sources with less emission and carbon footprints in their business portfolio, including the introduction of Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) in the aviation industry. Indonesia had created regulation in SAF utilization as blend component in Jet Fuel by the Energy & Mineral Resources Ministry Regulation No.12/2015: 2% (2016), 3% (2020) and 5% (2025). Considering the projected domestic demand of Jet Fuel 6.730.000 KL in 2030, requirement of SAF in Indonesia will reach 337.000 KL. In the contrary, there is no current SAF production in Indonesia despite of its potential feedstock for SAF such as Crude Palm Oil (CPO) Refined Bleached Deodorized Palm Kernel Oil (RBDPKO), or Used Coking Oil (UCO). The research analyzed the business aspect of SAF product development, especially bio-feedstock selection. This paper selected the most optimum feedstock for SAF by Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) method with 5 selection criterias: feedstock availability, feedstock price, required capital expenditure (CAPEX), profitability and SAF marketability. A base scenario of “highly regulated and fastly adopted SAF” is selected as the reference of developing the strategy. This scenario is indicated by early warning signs such as establishment of GHG emission reduction framework, establishment of incentives framework and high SAF demand from airlines.

Hydrogen blending in Italian natural gas grid: Scenario analysis and LCA

In this paper, a detailed analysis of the impact of hydrogen blending in the natural gas grid in terms of potential increase of Intermittent Renewable Energy Source (IRES) penetration, increase of electrolyzer power installed, reduction of CO2 emission and environmental footprint, is provided formulating models in EnergyPLAN and OpenLCA software. The Italian energy system is taken as case-study. Three scenarios have been analysed: BASELINE scenario represents the current energy system; MID-SCENARIO foresees a total IRES capacity of 158.17 GW (x5 compared to 2019 capacity) derived from the capability to convert intermittent electricity surplus in hydrogen and inject it in the natural gas grid; in the END-SCENARIO, the IRES capacity is pushed up to 272.1 GW.The main outcomes of the study attest that blending of hydrogen in the natural gas grid leads to beneficial impacts in terms of environmental footprint. Considering the global energy system, hydrogen production and blending in the natural gas grid leads to a maximum decrease of 15% in CO2 emissions compared to 2019. The impact is significant but limited by a threshold in the maximum hydrogen amount that the gas distribution infrastructure can currently accept (hydrogen molar fraction <20%).Focusing the study on the electricity generation sector, the reduction of CO2 emissions reaches −66% in the END-SCENARIO. The LCA index “Fossil resource scarcity” is reduced by up to −77% due to the replacement of fossil fuels, starting from coal. On the other hand, the LCA category “Mineral scarcity” undergoes an increase (x3.03 in MID-SCENARIO, ×2.73 in END-SCENARIO) due to the large amounts of materials needed to manufacture the photovoltaic plants, wind farms and electrolyzers, such as copper, aluminum, platinum, nickel, titanium and silicon, exacerbating the critical materials issue.