scholarly journals Potential of Biogas Production from Processing Residues to Reduce Environmental Impacts from Cassava Starch and Crisp Production—A Case Study from Malaysia

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 2975
Author(s):  
Jens Lansche ◽  
Sebastian Awiszus ◽  
Sajid Latif ◽  
Joachim Müller
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Biogas Production ◽  
Cassava Starch ◽  
Stress Index ◽  
Water Stress Index ◽  
Cassava Production ◽  
Starch Production

The cultivation of cassava (Manihot esculenta) is widely spread in a variety of tropical countries with an estimated annual production of 291.9 million tons. The crop is the most important source of carbohydrates in producing countries. In Malaysia, cassava is mainly cultivated for starch production. Despite the economic and nutritional importance of cassava, there is only limited knowledge available regarding the overall environmental impacts of cassava starch production or the production of alternative food products like cassava crisps. This study presents an environmental assessment of different scenarios of cassava production and processing by a life cycle assessment (LCA) approach. The results indicate that the environmental impacts of cassava-based products can be reduced considerably with the utilization of processing residues for anaerobic digestion if the resulting biogas is used for the production of electricity and heat. In the industrial scenario, the results indicate that the highest relative reductions are achieved for cumulated energy demand (CED), global warming potential (GWP) and deforestation (DEF) with −39%, −26% and −18%, respectively, while in the advanced scenario, environmental impacts for CED, GWP, ozone formation potential (OFP) and water stress index (WSI) can be reduced by more than 10% with −281%, −37%, −16% and −14%, respectively. The impacts for global warming potential found in this study are slightly higher compared to other studies that focused on the carbon footprint of starch production from cassava, while the savings due to biogas production are similar.

scholarly journals Environmental Impacts Evaluation of Sorbitol Production from Glucose

Eksergi ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rifkah Akmalina
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Electricity Consumption ◽  
Sustainable Improvement ◽  
Photochemical Oxidants ◽  
Main Consumer

A life cycle assessment (LCA) has been performed on sorbitol production from glucose, which aims to quantify and evaluate the environmental impacts that produced from the process. SuperPro Designer software was employed to perform the process simulation, while SimaPro was used to quantify the LCA.Potency of global warming, acidification, eutrophication, photochemical oxidants creation, abiotic depletion, and ozone layer depletion were evaluated. A gate-to-gate LCA study of sorbitol production showed that global warming potential (GWP) had the largest impact to environment with the value of 3.551 kg CO2 eq/kg sorbitol. Glucose and electricity consumption were known as two major contributors to GWP, and hydrogen reactor was the main consumer of electricity. The use of glucose were responsible for more than 50% of total environmentalimpact in each category. Performing heat integration in sorbitol processing is highly recommended for gate-togate system to reduce energy demand, thus decreasing the environmental impacts. Therefore, this LCA study may be applied to perform a sustainable improvement on sorbitol production process.Keywords: sorbitol; life cycle assessment; global warming potential

scholarly journals Influence of technical and electrical equipment in life cycle assessments of buildings: case of a laboratory and research building

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Hoxha ◽  
D. Maierhofer ◽  
M.R.M Saade ◽  
A. Passer
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Electrical Equipment ◽  
Primary Energy ◽  
Electronic Equipment ◽  
Detailed Result ◽  
Detailed Calculation ◽  
System Boundary ◽  
Operational Energy

Abstract Purpose A detailed assessment of the environmental impacts of the building requires a substantial amount of data that is time- and effort-consuming. However, limitation of the system boundary to certain materials and components can provide misleading impact calculation. In order to calculate the error gap between detailed and simplified assessments, the purpose of this article is to present a detailed calculation of the environmental impacts of the building by including in the system boundary, the technical, and electrical equipment. Method To that end, the environmental impacts of a laboratory and research building situated in Graz-Austria are assessed following the EN-15978 norm. Within the system boundaries of the study, the material and components of building fabric, technical, and electronic equipment for the building lifecycle stages of production, construction, replacement, operational energy and water, and end-of-life are considered. The input data regarding the quantity of materials is collected from the design and tendering documents, invoices, and from discussion with the head of the building’s construction site. Primary energy and global warming potential indicators are calculated on the basis of a functional unit of 1 m2 of energy reference area (ERA) per year, considering a reference building service life of 50 years. Results and discussion The primary energy indicator of the building is equal to 1698 MJ/m2ERA/year. The embodied impacts are found to be responsible for 28% of which 6.4% is due to technical and electronic equipment. Furthermore, the embodied impacts for the global warming potential, equal to 28.3 kg CO2e/m2ERA/year, are responsible for 73%. Together, technical and electrical equipment are the largest responsible aspects, accounting for 38% of the total impacts. Simplified and detailed result comparisons show a gap of 29% and 7.7% for global warming and primary energy indicators. These differences were from the embodied impacts and largely from the exclusion of electrical equipment from the study’s system boundary. Conclusions Technical and electrical equipment present a significant contribution to the overall environmental impacts of the building. Worthy of inclusion in the system boundary of the study, the environmental impacts of technical and electrical equipment must be calculated in detail or considered with a reliable ratio in the early design phase of the project. Further research is necessary to address the detailed impact calculation of the equipment and notably the minimization of their impacts.

scholarly journals Comparative Life Cycle Assessment of Steel and Concrete Construction Frames: A Case Study of Two Residential Buildings in Iran

Buildings ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 54
Author(s):  
Amir Oladazimi ◽  
Saeed Mansour ◽  
Seyed Abbas Hosseinijou
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Residential Buildings ◽  
Steel Frame ◽  
Complete Analysis ◽  
Environmental Damage ◽  
Concrete Frame

Given the fact that during the recent years the majority of buildings in Iran have been constructed either on steel or concrete frames, it is essential to investigate the environmental impacts of materials used in such constructions. For this purpose, two multi-story residential buildings in Tehran with a similar function have been considered in this study. One building was constructed with a steel frame and the other was constructed with a concrete frame. Using the life cycle assessment tool, a complete analysis of all the stages of a building’s life cycle from raw material acquisition to demolition and recycling of wastes was carried out. In this research, the environmental impacts included global warming potential in 100 years, acidification, eutrophication potential, human toxicity (cancer and non-cancer effects), resource depletion (water and mineral), climate change, fossil fuel consumption, air acidification and biotoxicity. It could be concluded from the results that the total pollution of the concrete frame in all eleven aforementioned impact factors was almost 219,000 tonnes higher than that of the steel frame. Moreover, based on the results, the concrete frame had poorer performance in all but one impact factor. With respect to global warming potential, the findings indicated there were two types of organic and non-organic gases that had an impact on global warming. Among non-organic emissions, CO2 had the biggest contribution to global warming potential, while among organic emissions, methane was the top contributor. These findings suggest the use of steel frames in the building industry in Iran to prevent further environmental damage; however, in the future, more research studies in this area are needed to completely investigate all aspects of decision on the choice of building frames, including economic and social aspects.

scholarly journals Environmental impact analysis of food waste anaerobic digestion and products utilization process

2019 ◽  
Vol 118 ◽  
pp. 04025
Author(s):  
Tao Wang ◽  
Fei Wang ◽  
Yangqing Hu
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Anaerobic Digestion ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Food Waste ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Impact Analysis ◽  
Combustion Engine ◽  
High Energy ◽  
Market Demand ◽  
Fuel Gas

Anaerobic digestion technology is a widely used technology for food waste treatment. It can produce clean fuel gas and realize harmless treatment of waste. Different ways of utilizing the digestion products vary depending on the market demand and production technology. In this paper, life cycle assessment (LCA) was conducted to analyse the environmental impacts of different processes in food waste anaerobic digestion treatment and compare different utilization strategies of digestion products especially the digestate. The results of this study indicated that the incineration of digestate had advantages in most environmental impacts except global warming potential (GWP), compared with composting as fertilizers. Besides that, incineration had the lower energy efficiency due to drying heat demand. The high energy conversion efficiency of internal combustion engine contributed much to reducing environmental impacts. It’s worth mentioning that the sufficient combustion performance of micro-turbine resulted in smaller global warming potential (GWP) and eutrophication potential (EP).

scholarly journals Influence of Atlantic Microclimates in Northern Spain on the Environmental Performance of Lightweight Concrete Single-Family Houses

Energies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (17) ◽  
pp. 4337
Author(s):  
Daniel González-Prieto ◽  
Yolanda Fernández-Nava ◽  
Elena Marañón ◽  
Maria Manuela Prieto
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Natural Gas ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Lightweight Concrete ◽  
Primary Energy ◽  
Hot Water ◽  
Embodied Energy ◽  
Single Family ◽  
Northern Spain

The use of lightweight concrete for the construction of single-family houses has become increasingly popular in Spain. In this paper, single-family houses with different shape factors and window-to-wall ratios are analysed from both a thermal and environmental perspective using Passive House Planning Package (PHPP) software to calculate the energy demand. The study has been carried out for different Atlantic microclimates (coastal, inland, and mountain) in northern Spain. What most affects the thermal energy used for air conditioning is the variation of the microclimates, so the study focuses mainly on this aspect. Operational energy for heating has decreased greatly via the use of high degree of insulation and hence the next task is to decrease the total energy consumed taking into account the embodied energy. Impacts on Primary Energy and Global Warming Potential are calculated using a cradle-to-grave approach. The energy use for heating and domestic hot water is analysed for different thicknesses of insulation under three energy supply scenarios: electricity only (for 2018 and with the Spanish decarbonisation plan for 2030); heat pump plus electricity; and natural gas boiler. Even for houses with a good level of insulation, the ratio of operational-to-total impacts varies significantly: from 46% to 87% for primary energy and from 31% to 75% for global warming potential, depending on the shape factor of the house, the microclimate and the heat supply scenario. By applying future environmental policies, electricity can become a more environmentally friendly option than natural gas.

scholarly journals Life-Cycle Energy Demand and Global Warming Potential of Computational Logic

2009 ◽  
Vol 43 (19) ◽  
pp. 7303-7309 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah B. Boyd ◽  
Arpad Horvath ◽  
David Dornfeld
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Computational Logic

scholarly journals Disposable Medical Masks: Environmental Costs

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
BURÇİN ATILGAN TÜRKMEN
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impact ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Functional Unit ◽  
Environmental Costs ◽  
Inventory Data

Abstract A massive increase in the use and production of masks worldwide has been seen in the current COVID-19 pandemic, which has contributed to reducing the transmission of the virus globally. This paper aims to evaluate the environmental impacts of disposable medical masks using the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) method, first for the selected functional unit related to the manufacturing of one disposable medical mask and then for the global manufacturing of this type of mask in 2020. The inventory data was constructed directly from the industry. The system boundaries include the fabric, nose wire, and ear loops parts, transportation of materials, body making, ultrasonic vending, and packaging steps. The results suggest that the global warming potential of a disposable medical mask is 0.02 g CO2-Eq. for which the main contributor is the packaging step (44%) followed by the life cycle of fabric (27%), and nose wire (14%) parts. In total, 52 billion disposable medical masks used worldwide consumes 25 TJ of energy in 2020. The global warming potential of disposable medical masks supplied in a year of the COVID-19 pandemic is 1.1 Mt CO2 eq., equivalent to around 1.3 billion return flights from Istanbul to New York. This paper assessed the hotspots in the medical mask, allowing for a significant reduction in the environmental impact of mask use. This can be used as a roadmap for future mask designs.

scholarly journals Techno-Cost-Benefit Analysis of Biogas Production from Industrial Cassava Starch Wastewater in Thailand for Optimal Utilization with Energy Storage

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 416
Author(s):  
Chatree Wattanasilp ◽  
Roongrojana Songprakorp ◽  
Annop Nopharatana ◽  
Charoenchai Khompatraporn
Keyword(s):  
Energy Storage ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Cost Benefit Analysis ◽  
Biogas Production ◽  
Oxygen Demand ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Operation Time ◽  
Cassava Starch ◽  
Utilization Pathway ◽  
Availability Assessment

This paper applied the optimization model of the biogas utilization pathway with the biogas utilization availability assessment to examine the effect of biogas system parameters on biogas utilization. The model analyzes the biogas utilization pathway availability and maximum profit to value added and productivity in biogas from industry wastewater in Thailand. The results showed that profit and availability of biogas utilization reduce biogas loss to flare, that it entails several conversion processes. The scenario for the biogas utilization pathway and storage with biogas production technology improves. Evaluated are operation time, waste and energy demand to the cassava starch usage during the production for 50–1000 tons per day. Five mature biogas production technologies were benchmarked evaluated based on the chemical oxygen demand removal efficiency and biogas yields. Subsequently, low-, medium-, and high-pressure storages and a battery storage were considered and discussed in this paper as suitable energy storage for each desired biogas plant operation. Five biogas utilization pathways, including converting biogas into thermal energy, generating electricity, and upgrading biogas to compressed biogas, were then compared. Those improved options in the scenario select suitable biogas technologies, storage, and application for value-added, reduce the environmental problems and renewable energy production from wastewater.

Comparative process-based life-cycle assessment of bioconcrete and conventional concrete

2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (5) ◽  
pp. 667-688 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milad Soleimani ◽  
Mohsen Shahandashti
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Global Warming Potential ◽  
Fossil Fuel ◽  
Human Toxicity ◽  
Conventional Concrete ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Cradle To Gate

Purpose Bioconcrete is widely believed to be environmentally beneficial over conventional concrete. However, the process of bioconcrete production involves several steps, such as waste recovery and treatment, that potentially present significant environmental impacts. Existing life-cycle assessments of bioconcrete are limited in the inventory and impact analysis; therefore, they do not consider all the steps involved in concrete production and the corresponding impacts. The purpose of this study is to extensively study the cradle-to-gate environmental impacts of all the production stages of two most common bioconcrete types (i.e. sludge-based bioconcrete and cement kiln dust-rice husk ash (CKD-RHA) bioconcrete) as opposed to conventional concrete. Design/methodology/approach A cradle-to-gate life-cycle assessment process model is implemented to systematically analyze and quantify the resources consumed and the environmental impacts caused by the production of bioconcrete as opposed to the production of conventional concrete. The impacts analyzed in this assessment include global warming potential, ozone depletion potential, eutrophication, acidification, ecotoxicity, smog, fossil fuel use, human toxicity, particulate air and water consumption. Findings The results indicated that sludge-based bioconcrete had higher levels of global warming potential, eutrophication, acidification, ecotoxicity, fossil fuel use, human toxicity and particulate air than both conventional concrete and CKD-RHA bioconcrete. Originality/value The contribution of this study to the state of knowledge is that it sheds light on the hidden impacts of bioconcrete. The contribution to the state of practice is that the results of this study inform the bioconcrete production designers about the production processes with the highest impact.

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