Renewable Energy for Environmental Protection: Comparative Life Cycle Assessment of different Palm Oil Mills in Nigeria

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kelechi E Anyaoha ◽  
Lulu Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Palm Oil ◽  
Oil Palm ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Palm Kernel ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Oil Palm Industry

Oil palm is expected to continue its dominance of global oil production, trade, and consumption. Nigeria will continue to play a dominate role in oil palm industry particularly on production and consumption. One of the biggest challenges to agricultural productivities is the need to reduce the environmental impacts and improves circularity in the operations. This study investigated the environmental impacts of different palm oil processors in Nigeria using life cycle assessment approach. The study covers the reception and processing of fresh fruit bunch (FFB) to palm oil. The inputs include generated empty fruit bunch, mesocarp fibre, palm kernel shell, palm oil mill effluent, diesel, and water and all outputs to the environment for a functional unit of 1 tonne of FFB. The large-scale processor performs worse than the semi-mechanised and smallholder processors in terms of climate change with 468 kg CO2-eq per tonne of FFB and better in the other impact categories. In large-scale mill, the contribution to climate change was reduced by 75% when the raw POME was used in composting EFB. Similarly, the contribution to climate change was decreased by 44% when biogas from POME substituted diesel in the semi-mechanised and smallholder mills. Concerted efforts by regulators are needed to ensure that stakeholders take steps towards improving management practices in the industry. Particularly on the generation and reuse of biomass and POME. This study will be very useful particularly on the contributions to climate change by Nigeria’s oil palm industry and other parts of sub-Saharan Africa.

scholarly journals Renewable Energy for Environmental Protection: Life Cycle Inventory of Nigeria’s Palm Oil Production

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kelechi E Anyaoha ◽  
Lulu Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Renewable Energy ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Palm Oil ◽  
Oil Palm ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Palm Kernel ◽  
Fresh Fruit Bunch ◽  
Technology Advancement ◽  
Oil Palm Industry

Energy consumption and associated greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions will increase significantly in the developing world. Scaling up bioenergy use and reducing GHG emissions is vital to achieving the Nationally Determined Contributions and advance the greener economy. This study explored the life cycle inventories of Nigeria’s palm oil processors towards supporting technology advancement and renewable energy transition in the African oil palm industry. We compiled a gate-to-gate life cycle inventory of large-scale, semi-mechanized, and smallholder processors of oil palm fresh fruit bunch in Nigeria. The inventory includes materials and energy inputs to the system and outputs and emissions to the environment. The inputs are diesel, water, electricity, empty fruit bunch, palm kernel shell and mesocarp fibre for a functional unit of 1 tonne of fresh fruit bunch while the outputs include crude palm oil, palm kernel, and all emissions to air and soil. Carbon dioxide (CO2) and dinitrogen oxide (N2O) emissions were 47% and 73% more in the smallholder mills than in the large-scale mills, respectively. The semi-mechanized mills produced 73% more N2O than the large-scale mills. In contrast, large-scale mills emit 71% more methane (CH4) than smallholder and semi-mechanized mills. The study reveals critical hot spots of GHG emissions in Nigeria’s oil palm industry, including CO2, N2O, and CH4 from the smallholder, semi-mechanized, and large-scale processors, respectively. These findings will contribute to supporting policymaking, technology advancement, and promoting the use of bioenergy within and outside the industry as an essential strategy for mitigating climate change.

scholarly journals Challenges for Life Cycle Assessment Of Palm Oil Production System

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Heinz Stichnothe ◽  
Cécile Bessou
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Palm Oil ◽  
Oil Palm ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Oil Production ◽  
Farm Income ◽  
Oil Palm Plantation

Growing demand for palm oil is driven by increasing human population, income growth as well as biodiesel stimulation programs. Covering an area of over ten million ha in Indonesia, palm oil production is also one of the most important sources of crop residues while processing generates large amounts of wastewater. Cultivation and processing of this crop are considered as potentially large sources of emissions. Improving environmental impacts of the palm oil production can help to reduce existing emissions while increasing yield and generating surplus energy and farm income. However, area expansion for oil palm plantation is perceived as  closely linked to illegal logging, deforestation and diminishing biodiversity. Apart from ensuring sustainable land use change, the use of residues is the most important criterion in ensuring sustainable palm oil. It is important to note that there are trade-offs (e.g. between maximizing bio energy production, reducing environmental impacts other than greenhouse gases (GHG), and sustaining soil fertility). Nitrogen (N) losses in palm oil production systems are a major environmental and economic issue. Unfortunately,  there is little comprehensive knowledge on how to calculate N-budgets in oil palm plantation in order to optimize fertilization, taking into account N-leaching and N-gaseous emissions. Land use, soil-carbon, N-emissions and biodiversity are key aspects of life cycle assessment (LCA) of palm oil production systems and they pose a number of methodological questions.

scholarly journals Life-Cycle Assessment of Crude Palm Oil Produced at Mill J, PT XYZ, Sumatera Island using Eco-indicator 99

2018 ◽  
Vol 159 ◽  
pp. 01028
Author(s):  
Pertiwi Andarani ◽  
Winardi Dwi Nugraha ◽  
Desinta Sawitri ◽  
Wiwik Budiawan
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Palm Oil ◽  
Production System ◽  
Crude Palm Oil ◽  
Agricultural Industry ◽  
Palm Oil Mill ◽  
Negative Impacts

The Crude Palm Oil industry has now become the largest agricultural industry in Indonesia. Nevertheless, the growth of CPO industry could also bring negative impacts on the environment if the company does not control their emissions and discharges properly. Life-cycle Assessment (LCA) is one of the tools that can assess the environmental impacts due to CPO production activities. This study aims to assess the potential environmental impacts arising from the CPO production system at Mill J, PT XYZ, Sumatera Island by using Eco-indicator 99. Based on this study, in 2015, the process in plantation and mill contributed to climate change category was 0.013 DALY or after normalized 202 Pt. Meanwhile, the land use category has 395 PDF*m2yr or 30.8 Pt. Meanwhile, all of the other categories were less than 30.8 Pt, hence, the highest impact of this CPO production system is climate change at the activities in industrial estate (fertilizers usage) and industry (emitted from waste water of palm oil mill).

Investigation of the two-decade environmental impact of large-scale agricultural cultivation and its impact on climate change in the Lajta-Project

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
András Polgár ◽  
Karolina Horváth ◽  
Imre Mészáros ◽  
Adrienn Horváth ◽  
András Bidló ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impact ◽  
Winter Wheat ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Crop Production ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Winter Barley ◽  
Cultivated Plants ◽  
Agricultural Activity

<p>Crop production is applied on about half of Hungary’s land area, which amounts to approximately 4.5 million hectares. The agricultural activity has significant environmental impacts.</p><p>Our work aims the time series investigation of the impacts of large-scale agricultural cultivation<strong> </strong>on environment and primarily on climate change in<strong> </strong>the test area by applying environmental life cycle assessment (LCA) method.</p><p>The investigated area of Lajta Project can be found in the triangle formed by the settlements Mosonszolnok, Jánossomorja and Várbalog, in the north-western corner of Hungary, in Győr-Moson-Sopron county. The area has intense agri-environment characteristics, almost entirely lacking of grasslands and meadows.</p><p>We were looking for the answer to the question “To what extent does agricultural activity on this area impact the environment and how can it contribute to climate change during a given period?” The selection of the plants included in the analysis was justified by their significant growing area. We analysed the cultivation data of 5 crops: canola, winter barley, winter wheat, green maize and maize. Material flows of arable crop production technologies were defined in time series by the agricultural parcel register data. These covered the size of the area actually cultivated, the operational processes, records on seeds, fertilizer and pesticide use and harvest data by parcels. The examined environmental inventory database contained also the fuel consumption and lubricating oil usage of machine operations, and the water usage of chemical utilization.</p><p>In the life cycle modelling of cultivation, we examined 13 years of maize, 20 years of green maize, 20 years of winter barley, 18 years of winter wheat and 15 years of canola data calculated on 1 ha unit using GaBi life cycle analysis software.</p><p>In addition, we also calculated by an average cultivation model for all cultivated plants with reference data to 1 ha and 1 year period.</p><p>We applied methods and models in our life cycle impact assessment. According to the values of the impact categories, we set up the following increasing environmental ranking of plant cultivation: (1) canola has minimum environmental impacts followed by (2) green maize and (3) maize with slightly higher values, (4) winter barley has 6 times higher values preceded by (5) winter wheat with a slight difference. The previous environmental ranking of the specific cultivated plants’ contribution was also confirmed as regards the overall environmental impact: canola (1.0%) – green maize (4.9%) – maize (7.1%) – winter barley (43.1%) – winter wheat (44.0%).</p><p>Environmental impact category indicator results cumulated to total cultivation periods and total crop growing areas (quantitative approach) display the specific environmental footprints by crops. Increasing environmental ranking of environmental impacts resulted from cultivating the sample area is the following: (1) canola – (2) maize – (3) green maize – (4) winter barley – (5) winter wheat. The slight difference resulted in the rankings in quantitative approach according to the rankings of territorial approach on the investigated area is due to the diversity of cultivation time factor and the crop-growing parameter of the specific crops.</p><p>Acknowledgement: Our research was supported by the „Lajta-Project”.</p>

scholarly journals How (Carbon) Negative Is Direct Air Capture? Life Cycle Assessment of an Industrial Temperature-Vacuum Swing Adsorption Process

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Deutz ◽  
André Bardow
Keyword(s):  
Energy Source ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Low Carbon ◽  
Direct Air Capture ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Negative Emissions ◽  
Air Capture

Current climate targets require negative emissions. Direct air capture (DAC) is a promising negative emission technology, but energy and materials demands lead to trade-offs with indirect emissions and other environmental impacts. Here, we show by Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) that the first commercial DAC plants in Hinwil and Hellisheiði can achieve negative emissions already today with carbon capture efficiencies of 85.4 % and 93.1 %. Climate benefits of DAC, however, depend strongly on the energy source. When using low-carbon energy, as in Hellisheiði, adsorbent choice and plant construction become important with up to 45 and 15 gCO<sub>2e</sub> per kg CO<sub>2</sub> captured, respectively. Large-scale deployment of DAC for<br>1 % of the global annual CO<sub>2</sub> emissions would not be limited by material and energy availability. Other environmental impacts would increase by less than 0.057 %. Energy source and efficiency are essential for DAC to enable both negative emissions and low-carbon fuels.<br>

Towards Prospective Sustainability Life Cycle Assessment

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abigail R. Clarke-Sather ◽  
Saleh Mamun ◽  
Daniel Nolan ◽  
Patrick Schoff ◽  
Matthew Aro ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Environmental Effects ◽  
Circular Economy ◽  
Economic Impacts ◽  
Cultural Perspective

Abstract Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a well-established tool for measuring environmental effects of existing technology. While the most recent LCA research has focused on environmental impacts, in particular on the effects of climate change, there is growing interest in how LCA can be used prospectively. A 2019 workshop in Duluth, Minnesota sought to define the needs and priorities of prospective life cycle assessment from a perspective that considers diverse viewpoints. In that workshop, participants outlined frameworks for how sustainability impacts might figure into a prospective LCA tool focused on assessing technologies currently under development. Those frameworks included social and economic impacts, which were characterized alongside environmental impacts, with the goal of predicting potential impacts and developing recommendations for improving technologies. Cultural perspective, in particular the roots of the German circular economy, was explored and held up as a reminder that different communities are influenced by different sustainability concerns, leading to diverse policy and cultural prerogatives. The purpose of this paper is to catalyze conversation about how to frame methodologies of existing LCA tools that could be used in a prospective sustainability context.

scholarly journals Implementation of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) for oil palm industry in Aceh Province, Indonesia

2020 ◽  
Vol 542 ◽  
pp. 012046
Author(s):  
Kiman Siregar ◽  
Ichwana ◽  
Indra Sakti Nasution ◽  
Sholihati ◽  
Intan Sofiah ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Oil Palm ◽  
Aceh Province ◽  
Oil Palm Industry

Evaluating the environmental impacts of bio-hydrogenated diesel production from palm oil and fatty acid methyl ester through life cycle assessment

2017 ◽  
Vol 142 ◽  
pp. 1210-1221 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bulin Boonrod ◽  
Chaiwat Prapainainar ◽  
Phavanee Narataruksa ◽  
Angsana Kantama ◽  
Worayut Saibautrong ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Fatty Acid ◽  
Methyl Ester ◽  
Fatty Acid Methyl Ester ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Palm Oil ◽  
Acid Methyl Ester ◽  
Acid Methyl ◽  
Diesel Production
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