Potential Environmental Advantages Research Articles

A Comprehensive Review of Artificial Intelligence and Colon Capsule Endoscopy: Opportunities and Challenges.

Colon capsule endoscopy (CCE) enables a comprehensive, non-invasive, and painless evaluation of the colon, although it still has limited indications. The lengthy reading times hinder its wider implementation, a drawback that could potentially be overcome through the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) models. Studies employing AI, particularly convolutional neural networks (CNNs), demonstrate great promise in using CCE as a viable option for detecting certain diseases and alterations in the colon, compared to other methods like colonoscopy. Additionally, employing AI models in CCE could pave the way for a minimally invasive panenteric or even panendoscopic solution. This review aims to provide a comprehensive summary of the current state-of-the-art of AI in CCE while also addressing the challenges, both technical and ethical, associated with broadening indications for AI-powered CCE. Additionally, it also gives a brief reflection of the potential environmental advantages of using this method compared to alternative ones.

A comparison of the environmental sustainability of brick‐and‐mortar retailing and online retailing: Contrasting academic research and consumer perceptions

AbstractSustainability has become paramount in society and retail. Therefore, this study aims to compare the environmental sustainability of brick‐and‐mortar retail and e‐commerce. A literature review identifies various factors, such as buildings, shopping trips, order bundling, returns, packaging, transport and logistics, and environmentally conscious behavior, that determine the channel that is superior in terms of environmental sustainability. While these factors are context‐specific and depend on several actors (e.g., consumers, retailers, and logistics service providers), most studies consider e‐commerce to be more environmentally friendly than purchases from brick‐and‐mortar stores. However, this review demonstrates that most previous studies have focused on objective criteria (e.g., CO2). Therefore, to reflect the importance of consumers' perspectives on channel choice, we conducted four empirical studies that provide insights into the perceived environmental sustainability of each channel. In contrast to experts' views, consumers perceive e‐commerce as less sustainable than brick‐and‐mortar retailing. Hence, online retailers should improve their communication strategies and highlight the potential environmental advantages of e‐commerce and omni‐channel retailing. Brick‐and‐mortar retailers are advised to reduce the environmental damage they cause and encourage their customers to act in an eco‐friendly manner.

Parametric Assessment to Evaluate and Compare the Carbon Footprint of Diverse Manufacturing Processes for Building Complex Surfaces

At present, building design is faced with a need to properly manage complex geometries and surfaces. This fact is not only driven by the increased demand for visually stunning spaces but also stems from the rise of new design paradigms, such as “user-centred design”, that include bespoke optimization approaches. Nevertheless, the escalating adoption of customized components and one-off solutions raises valid concerns regarding the optimal use of energy and resources in this production paradigm. This study focuses on the Life Cycle Assessment of a novel Cement–Textile Composite (CTC) patented material. It combines a synthetic reinforcing textile with a customized concrete matrix, to generate rigid elements that are able to statically preserve complex spatial arrangements, particularly double-curvature surfaces. Moreover, the CTC offers a low-volume cost-effective alternative for custom-made cladding applications. The study performed a comparative carbon footprint assessment of the CTC production process in contrast to other technologies, such as CNC milling and 3D printing. To facilitate meaningful comparisons among diverse construction alternatives and to derive generalized data capable of characterizing their overall capacity, independent of specific production configurations, the present study implemented a generalized parametric shape of reference defined as a bounding box (BBOX), which encloses the volume of the target shape. Comparing different production technologies of the same shape with the same BBOX results in a significant carbon saving, up to 9/10th of the carbon footprint, when the CTC technology is adopted. The study therefore highlights the potential environmental advantages of CTC in the fields of architectural design and building engineering.

Economic and environmental assessment of automotive plastic waste end‐of‐life options: Energy recovery versus chemical recycling

AbstractMost automotive plastic waste (APW) is landfilled or used in energy recovery as it is unsuitable for high‐quality product mechanical recycling. Chemical recycling via pyrolysis offers a pathway toward closing the material loop by handling this heterogeneous waste and providing feedstock for producing virgin plastics. This study compares chemical recycling and energy recovery scenarios for APW regarding climate change impact and cumulative energy demand (CED), assessing potential environmental advantages. In addition, an economic assessment is conducted. In contrast to other studies, the assessments are based on pyrolysis experiments conducted with an actual waste fraction. Mass balances and product composition are reported. The experimental data is combined with literature data for up‐ and downstream processes for the assessment. Chemical recycling shows a lower net climate change impact (0.57 to 0.64 kg CO2e/kg waste input) and CED (3.38 to 4.41 MJ/kg waste input) than energy recovery (climate change impact: 1.17 to 1.25 kg CO2e/kg waste input; CED: 6.94 to 7.97 MJ/kg waste input), while energy recovery performs better economically (net processing cost of −0.05 to −0.02€/kg waste input) compared to chemical recycling (0.05 to 0.08€/kg waste input). However, chemical recycling keeps carbon in the material cycle contributing to a circular economy and reducing the dependence on fossil feedstocks. Therefore, an increasing circularity of APW through chemical recycling shows a conflict between economic and environmental objectives.

3D printing of circular materials: Comparative environmental analysis of materials and construction techniques

The use of 3D printing in construction activities can help to reduce waste, lower energy consumption, and minimize the environmental impact of building projects. As technology continues to advance, it has the potential to play a major role in the development of cleaner, more sustainable production processes in the construction industry. For each such innovation, it is essential to ensure its environmental sustainability at an early stage of development. This study aims to assess the potential environmental advantages and disadvantages of newly developed construction and demolition waste (CDW)-based geopolymer materials for 3D printing of built-environment structures. The study identifies potential "hot spots" of the developed process where environmental impact is highest and develops strategies to reduce or mitigate negative impacts. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) was carried out for three cases of CDW-based 3D printed structures, Portland cement-based 3D printed structures, and conventional masonry construction methods and materials, to analyze the environmental impact of CDW-based 3D-printed designs and their comparative analysis. The results showed that geopolymer-based 3D printed construction resulted in the lowest global warming potential of 488 [kg CO2 eq] as compared to 595.6 [kg CO2 eq] for ordinary Portland cement-based structure and 533.7 [kg CO2 eq] for conventional masonry construction of the equivalent structure. The main environmental "hot spot" identified for the geopolymer-based 3D printed construction process was the amount of electrical energy required for the mechanical processing of waste materials, which was more than 61% of the total GWP impact. In addition to decreasing solid CDW, the developed approach has significant potential for improvement by using more sustainable energy sources and reducing the amount of solid CDW generated.

Environmental change through financial innovation: A systematic analysis of Program-Related donations

The research investigated the connection between Program-Related donations (PRDs), a rapidly growing philanthropy option, and Environmental development using fresh data. PRDs are distinguished by their adaptability, which permits the conversion of complex assets and the separation of giving decisions from the timing of tax benefits. While PRDs are often classed by their sponsor type, we provide a new classification scheme that integrates their economic purpose, including the consumers targeted, style and services provided, and emphasis on grant-making. This classification reveals that PRDs that provide FinTech tools, liquidity transformation, and grants concentrating on diversity, equity, and inclusion have had the most recent growth. Conditional correlations indicate that PRDs with a more innovative approach to service provide more grants to charities serving locations with high inequality, during times of greatest financial need, and with more efficient operations. The research showed that PRDs are connected with a variety of outcomes that appear to be associated with potential environmental advantages and addressing social issues such as diversity, fairness, and inequality.

Enzymes as an environmental bottleneck in cellulosic ethanol production: Does on-site production solve it?

With the progressive implementation of Low-Carbon Policies based on Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodologies to assess climate change mitigation, biofuels’ potential environmental advantages could finally be translated into economic revenues, especially for residue-based production chains. This implies, however, tackling environmental hotspots along the Life Cycle, such as the use of enzymes, an important input in cellulosic ethanol production. While relevant, however, aspects of enzyme manufacturing, crucial to the LCA results, are often oversimplified in databases or even undisclosed, which might render the accounting for this flow unreliable. A potential solution for this is to model enzyme production, disclosing aspects such as carbon source uptakes, energy consumption and purification steps, all of which may carry significant environmental burdens, especially for fossil-reliant procedures. Integrating these steps into the biorefinery process design as an on-site operation, however, would allow access to renewable energy and carbon sources for enzyme production, potentially reducing their burden in the final biofuel LCA profile, when compared with off-site supply. This work, then, aims to evaluate the effect of inserting on-site enzyme production within a stand-alone second-generation (2G) biorefinery, using sugarcane straw as feedstock, to produce ethanol and electricity, as opposed to off-site enzyme supply from manufacturers. The results show that adopting on-site production can reduce the overall environmental impact profile for cellulosic ethanol, in comparison to off-site supply, even though off-site data present significant variability among databases and literature. This trend persisted for varied enzyme dosages in the saccharification process and for different inventories to model off-site supply. The reference inventories for off-site supply lack transparency and details, while also displaying large discrepancies between impact indicators, indicating the need to pursue more consistent, reliable, and complete inventories for its modelling in LCA. Compared to first-generation (1G) sugarcane ethanol, 2G-ethanol (with on-site enzyme production) demonstrated a reduction in the Global Warming Potential category of around 80%. However, relevant trade-offs for 2G ethanol (with off-site enzyme supply) were observed – regarding ecotoxicity, mineral scarcity, eutrophication and even the potential GHG reduction – when different enzyme inventories are used.

Technical and environmental performances of alternative treatments for challenging plastics waste

The recovery of resources from streams of mixed plastics waste is a technological and economic challenge since they contain various (and generally non-compatible) polymers, different (and often hazardous) additives, as well as multilayer structures and fiber-reinforced composites. Only a too limited part of these plastics - such as those coming from waste of electric and electronic equipment (WEEE), end-of-life vehicles (ELV) and construction and demolition waste (C&DW) - can be treated by mechanical techniques in the conventional recycling facilities, and a still smaller part is reintroduced into the market. Some innovative treatments have been recently proposed and appear suitable for these challenging waste streams. The paper describes technical characteristics of some of them, and compares their environmental performances with those of currently adopted management options. An environmental life cycle assessment was developed by taking into account the substitutability factor of obtained products and technological readiness level of the analyzed resource recovery processes. The focus is on new treatments of dissolution/precipitation, supercritical fluid extraction, catalytic pyrolysis, and waste-to-energy (WtE) equipped with carbon capture and storage unit (CCS). The results highlight the promising performances of some of these new options, quantify their potential environmental advantages, and suggest to take them into account in the definition of sustainable management schemes for the examined challenging plastics wastes. In particular, physical recycling by dissolution/precipitation process applied to one tonne of WEEE plastics, not treatable by mechanical recycling, can save up to about 2 tCO2,eq. with respect to landfill disposal and WtE with CCS, and more than 3 tCO2,eq. with respect to WtE without CCS. The performances of WtE with CCS appear of interest, particularly for WEEE and ELV mixed plastics, allowing to save up to 0.5 tCO2,eq. and 1.7 tCO2,eq., with respect to pyrolysis and WtE without CCS, respectively.

Planning for social sustainability: mechanisms of social exclusion in densification through large-scale redevelopment projects in Swiss cities

In many cities, there has been renewed interest over the last 30 years in densification as part of wider efforts to combat urban sprawl. In daily practice, however, densification is a contested process because of its redistributive effects. Next to potential environmental advantages, it produces both benefits and losses for different individuals and households. The redistributive effects are an expression of conflicts between environmental, economic, and social dimensions of sustainability. We show that the latter is heavily impacted: if densification projects are not designed to the needs of people who are actually supposed to benefit from it—the residents—low-income groups are at risk of social displacement. This scenario is highly unsustainable. By using a neo-institutional approach and comparative case study methodology conducted in Switzerland, we analyze the institutional rules and the involved actors’ strategies when dealing with densification projects. We explain the mechanisms leading to the loss of social qualities when competing with economic interests of investors and authorities.

A comparative study of Chinese and American public perceptions of shale gas development

This paper examines public perceptions of shale gas development in China and the United States. Public perceptions are important, as they are known to influence public policy at national and local levels of government in both multi-party and single-party governance systems. Online surveys were conducted in several states/provinces in each country, the US survey in 2014 (N = 2833); the China survey in 2016 (N = 1571). Similar survey instruments were used in both countries. The survey results show that the reported levels of public support for shale gas development among Chinese respondents in select provinces are significantly higher than that among US respondents in the states included in this study. Perceptions of the advantages and disadvantages of shale gas have both similarities and differences. Shale gas is perceived favorably in both samples because it is seen as a way to reduce dependence on foreign energy suppliers and strengthen the economy. The potential environmental advantages appear to be relatively more important to Chinese respondents than to American respondents. The statement “shale gas development is good for the environment because it substitutes dirty energy such as coal and oil” is seen as “Extremely important” by 54.23% of all Chinese respondents but by only 33.75% of American respondents. When it comes to the potential disadvantages of shale gas development, concerns about impacts on drinking water quality are important in both samples. Earthquakes related to shale gas is the second most important concern to Chinese respondents but a lesser concern to US respondents. We argue that the results are consistent with risk experiences, a variety of socio-cultural theories, and differences in media coverage in the two countries. Future work should examine how public perceptions in the two countries change over time, and how the stances of environmental groups, government, and industry may influence public opinion.

Compost Functions as Effective Replacement for Peat-Based Potting Media in Organic Greenhouse Transplant Production

Commercial horticulture in many regions of the world depends upon Sphagnum peat as a potting-media substrate, but extracting peat has serious environmental consequences. Composts may be able to serve as effective substitutes for peat and offer potential environmental advantages. The suitability of compost as potting media depends upon the raw materials as well as processing methods used. This study includes two related experiments—one with beet (Beta vulgaris L.) and the other with tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.)—aimed at assessing the potential viability of farm-produced, food-residuals compost as a replacement for peat-based potting media in the production of organic vegetable transplants. The experiments were conducted in 2021 on the Berea College Farm in Kentucky, USA, a USDA certified organic farm. The results indicated that potting media composed of 75% to 100% compost performed as well as fertilized, peat-based growing media for plant growth. Further, although weeds were present in the compost, weed pressure was not severe enough to adversely affect crop growth. Thus, sterilization of compost, which did eliminate weeds in the compost, was not deemed necessary for using the compost as a partial or complete potting medium. Compost pasteurization was also assessed but was ineffective in destroying weed seeds.

A Comparative Environmental Life Cycle Assessment of the Combustion of Ammonia/Methane Fuels in a Tangential Swirl Burner

Ammonia has been proposed as a replacement for fossil fuels. Like hydrogen, emissions from the combustion of ammonia are carbon-free. Unlike hydrogen, ammonia is more energy dense, less explosive, and there exists extensive experience in its distribution. However, ammonia has a low flame speed and combustion emits nitrogen oxides. Ammonia is produced via the Haber-Bosch process which consumes large amounts of fossil fuels and requires high temperatures and pressures. A life cycle assessment to determine potential environmental advantages and disadvantages of using ammonia is necessary. In this work, emissions data from experiments with generating heat from tangential swirl burners using ammonia cofired with methane employing currently available technologies were utilized to estimate the environmental impacts that may be expected. Seven ammonia sources were combined with two methane sources to create 14 scenarios. The impacts from these 14 scenarios were compared to those expected from using pure methane. The results show that using ammonia from present-day commercial production methods will result in worse global warming potentials than using methane to generate the same amount of heat. Only two scenarios, methane from biogas combined with ammonia from hydrogen from electricity and nuclear power via electrolysis and subsequent ammonia synthesis using nitrogen from the air, showed reductions in global warming potential. Subsequent analysis of other environmental impacts for these two scenarios showed potentially lower impacts for respiratory organics, terrestrial acidification-nutrification and aquatic acidification depending on how the burner is operated. The other eight environmental impacts were worse than the methane scenario because of activities intrinsic to the generation of electricity via wind power and nuclear fission. The results show that generating heat from a tangential swirl burner using ammonia currently available technologies will not necessarily result in improved environmental benefits in all categories. Improvements in renewable energy technologies could change these results positively. Other means of producing ammonia and improved means of converting ammonia to energy must continue to be explored.

Analyzing the packaging strategy of packaging-free supermarkets

Providing consumers with groceries generates large quantities of waste at various supply-chain stages. Packaging-free supermarkets like “Original Unverpackt” (OU) in Berlin (Germany) aim to reduce this waste and the associated negative environmental impacts. To date, there have been no studies with comprehensive, quantitative environmental data for packaging-free supermarkets. In analyzing the OU model, our goal is to analyze the potential environmental advantages of packaging-free supermarkets, quantify and identify the potential changes of environmental burden on this example. A comparative Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for six typical OU-supermarket product packages - chia-seeds, shower gel, fruit bears, dishwashing detergent, noodles and tofu is conducted. Following ISO 14040 and ISO 14044 guidelines, we compare the OU product packaging types to their conventionally packaged counterparts. First, seven impact categories according to the LCA impact assessment methodology “ReCiPe Midpoint (Hierarchist) without long term” are examined. These seven categories are then aggregated to generate an overall result. To test the stability of the results, the parameters are varied in a sensitivity analysis. In the impact category, “climate change” four out of six OU product packaging types perform better than their counterparts. However, the package of fruit bears at OU performs 45% worse than the counterpart, due to extra effort required to clean the dispenser. An 83% increase in greenhouse gas emissions for the OU tofu package made of glass results mainly from the production of the glass and its transport. Although the OU packaging strategy performs relatively well, there is still room for improvement. Here, considering the entire supply chain plays an important role, since customer behavior, cleaning processes, the choice of packaging material, and the means of transport significantly affect the LCA.

Environmental assessment of CO2 mineralisation for sustainable construction materials

Mineral carbonation is a carbon utilisation technology in which an alkaline material reacts with carbon dioxide forming stable carbonates that can have different further uses, for instance as construction material. The alkaline material can be a residue from industrial activities (e.g. metallurgic slags) while CO2 can be recovered from industrial flue gasses. Mineral carbonation presents several potential environmental advantages: (i) industrial residues valorisation, (ii) CO2 sequestration and (iii) substitution of conventional concrete based on Portland cement (PC).However, both the carbonation and the CO2 recovery processes require energy. To understand the trade-off between the environmental benefits and drawbacks of CO2 recovery and mineral carbonation, this study presents a life cycle assessment (LCA) of carbonated construction blocks from mineral carbonation of stainless steel slags. The carbonated blocks are compared to traditional PC-based concrete blocks with similar properties.The results of the LCA analysis show that the carbonated blocks present lower environmental impacts in most of the analysed impact categories. The key finding is that the carbonated blocks present a negative carbon footprint. Nonetheless, the energy required represents the main environmental hotspot. An increase in the energy efficiency of the mineral carbonation process and a CO2 valorisation network are among the suggestions to further lower the environmental impacts of carbonated blocks production.Finally, the LCA results can promote the development of policy recommendations to support the implementation of mineral carbonation technology. Further research should enable the use of mineral carbonation on a broader range and large volume of alkaline residues.

Life cycle assessment of a ceramic glaze containing copper slags and its application on ceramic tile

AbstractEven though copper slags have many possible applications, their disposal is still practiced, creating long‐term waste management problems. This led to the investigation of new products for residential applications, taking advantages of the interesting chemical properties of copper slag. This study aims to assess the environmental impact of the use of copper slag as secondary raw material in a ceramic glaze composition and to compare it with a traditional glaze. A manufacturing process was designed, through an industrial scale up operation from experimental laboratory data and the entire life cycle of the products was analyzed using the Life‐cycle assessment (LCA) methodology. Considering the production of a ceramic glaze containing copper slag, the most impacting process resulted the one related to frit production, due to the large amount of thermal energy necessary for the raw materials melting. The comparative LCA analysis carried out between the frit obtained from metallurgical slags and a traditional one, demonstrated that the innovative ceramic frit has a greater environmental advantage. The LCA analysis allowed to highlight the most impactful stages of an industrial process using copper slag as a secondary raw material for glaze production and to quantify the potential environmental advantages of this operation.

The potential impact of synthetic animal protein on livestock production: The new “war against agriculture”?

The rise of organic chemistry in the 1800s quickly lead to the realisation that products previously derived from plants and animals could be derived synthetically from alternative organic sources. Although it slowly became clear that there were limitations to this technology, the goal of producing animal protein synthetically has remained a tantalising prospect for scientists, with new hopes being rekindled throughout the years as new knowledge emerged or technologies developed. The demonstration of synthetic meat (also termed in vitro meat) in 2013 revived this dream and, with the refinement of protein synthesis technologies, 31 start-ups are now working to become the first company to market synthetic animal protein. The potentially transformative nature of this technology make it essential to understand its potential to disrupt conventional agriculture at an early stage. This paper addresses this issue by examining historical substitutions that have lead to the decline or even decimation of agricultural industries, namely: alizarin (madder), indigotin (indigo) and vanillin (vanilla). Following an outlining of the historical cases themselves, it identifies substitution product complexity, ease of synthesis, compatibility with industrial processes, and contamination of the natural product as four key issues that affect the substitution transition. Analysis of the specific synthetic animal protein case suggests that, while there are many additional issues that could affect any transition, three aspects are key: development of transferrable technologies in the medical sector, potential environmental advantages, and a lack of consumer resistance to its “unnatural” nature. Finally, the paper argues that rather than a complete substitution (e.g. alizarin & indigo) a furcated market (e.g. vanillin) with various classes of protein production is likely to emerge – within which industrial livestock production will struggle to compete against cheap synthetic alternatives.

Socioeconomic implications of biofuels deployment through an Input-Output approach. A case study in Uruguay

Some countries in the world aim to increase biofuel production and consumption as a way to decarbonize the transport sector and transit to a low carbon economy. Besides their potential environmental advantages compared to conventional fuels, biofuels may also bring other socioeconomic benefits. Using the Input-Output Analysis, this study has looked at the socio-economic impacts associated to the biofuels targets established in Uruguay by estimating the associated gross and net effects on production of goods and services; value added and job creation categorized into rural and non-rural. Next, the impacts on the Uruguay's balance of payments, energy security and tax revenues have been estimated and added to the previous effects. When it comes to value added, bioethanol from sugarcane ranks first among the considered biofuels with 431 million US$2018, followed by bioethanol from sorghum and biodiesel. As to job creation, around 34,000 full time new jobs are created as a result of sugarcane bioethanol, twice as much as from biodiesel. Of these figures, rural employment share represents a 13% and 6% in the case of sugarcane bioethanol and biodiesel respectively. On concluding result from this study is that while biofuel production costs in Uruguay are higher than fossil fuel, when the economic effects on tax revenues and balance of payments are added to the previous socio-economic impacts, the total benefits from biofuels compensate the extra costs. However, this situation may be altered in the future as a result of changes in biofuel production costs, fiscal policies as well as import and export prices variations.

Dynamic metal-ligand coordination for multicolour and water-jet rewritable paper

Rewritable paper has recently become prevalent in both academic research and marketplace due to the potential environmental advantages, including forest conservation, pollution reduction, energy saving and resource sustainability. However, its real-life applications are limited by a lack of effective strategy to realize multicolour and water-jet printing on rewritable paper with long legible image-lasting times. Herein, we report an effective strategy to construct rewritable paper based on colour or luminescence switching induced by dynamic metal–ligand coordination. This type of rewritable paper can be conveniently utilized for multicolour water-jet printing by using aqueous solutions containing different metal salts as ink. In addition, the printed images on the water-jet rewritable paper can be retained for a long time (> 6 months), which shows great progress compared to previous work. We believe that this type of rewritable paper could be considered as a prototype for multicolour water-jet printing to meet the practical needs.

Life cycle assessment (LCA) of biogas versus dung combustion household cooking systems in developing countries – A case study in Ethiopia

In developing countries dung cakes combustion as a household cooking fuel is a common practice; however this traditional fuel comes along with related environmental issues. The objective of this study was to assess the environmental impacts of the substitution of dung combustion by biogas systems in rural Ethiopia. For this purpose, the method of life cycle assessment was applied according to ISO 14040 and 14044 standards with a consequential life cycle assessment approach. In terms of greenhouse gas emissions, the results demonstrate that mainly avoided methane and nitrous oxide emissions from dung drying and dung combustion lead to an environmental advantage of biogas systems in all scenarios of this study. Also the utilization of biogas digestate as organic fertilizer contributes considerably to savings of greenhouse gas emissions. The results indicate that about 13′542t of carbon dioxide equivalents can be saved annually in Ethiopia by the biogas plants installed in the years 2009–2013. Dung combustion causes indoor pollution by releasing high amounts of nitrogen oxides and particulate matter emissions and thereby having a direct negative impact on health. These emissions can be reduced considerably when using biogas instead of dung cakes for the provision of household cooking energy. Substituting traditional energy sources - dung cakes - with biogas systems, would lead to primary energy demand savings as well as potential environmental advantages regarding global warming, eutrophication, acidification, terrestrial eco-toxicity and human toxicity. Besides that, lower emissions from plant-available nutrients as well as particulate matter reduction, can create the basis for more efficient agricultural systems and potentially increase the health of the rural population. Nonetheless, to ensure a reduction of global warming potential it is mandatory building technically mature biogas plants with low methane leakage.

The utilization of light weight boards for reducing air emissions by the German wood industry – a perspective?

BackgroundResource saving product development is one competitive advantage for companies. Forestbased industries try to realize this amongst others with lightweight board solutions.Using lightweight boards is discussed in the wood industry for several years and could be technically realized nowadays on an industrial scale. Advantages by using lightweight boards are expected in costs due to reduced wood requirements as well as in respect to logistics. In discussion are potential environmental advantages of an enhanced use of lightweight boards.The objective of the paper is to identify and quantify the environmental impacts due to an increased use of lightweight boards in the furniture industry. The focus rests on the so-called Kyoto greenhouse gas emissions, NMVOC and formaldehyde.ResultsThe study grounds on a process-based material flow model, which depicts the use of forest resources in Germany. The situation in 2005 is compared with a scenario, which describes a partial substitution of conventional boards by lightweight boards using sandwich design.Overall the greenhouse gas emissions will decrease, even though the overall decline is rather small.ConclusionsBy this lightweight boards could be a perspective for the German wood-industry to reduce emissions into air noteworthy. The main causes are a reduced requirement for adhesives and binders, logistics and thermal use of residuals.