Biotechnological processes are typically perceived to be greener than chemical processes. A life cycle assessment (LCA) was performed to compare the chemical and biochemical synthesis of lactones obtained by Baeyer–Villiger oxidation. The LCA is prospective (based on experiments at a small scale with primary data) because the process is at an early stage. The results show that the synthesis route has no significant effect on the climate change impact [(1.65±0.59) kgCO2
gproduct−1 vs. (1.64±0.67) kgCO2
gproduct−1]. Key process performance metrics affecting the environmental impact were evaluated by performing a sensitivity analysis. Recycling of solvents and enzyme were shown to provide an advantage to the enzymatic synthesis. Additionally, the climate change impact was decreased by 71 % if renewable electricity was used. The study shows that comparative LCAs can be used to usefully support decisions at an early stage of process development.
This article proposes a multicriteria approach and a decision support system to support multimodal transportation planning decisions by considering transportation delay, costs, and carbon emissions. The methodology is implemented into CarbonRoadMap, a web-based application that allows a decision maker to browse through the set of Pareto-optimal paths, display them on a map to support the selection of the desired optimum solution by weighting the three criteria. This decision support tool shows the benefits of using a multicriteria optimization methodology to obtain a set of paths, as the resulting solutions are very different from one another.
In the field of construction, wood products are known to have environmental benefits in comparison with materials like steel and concrete, especially to mitigate climate change. Since wood is an anisotropic material, comparisons with other building materials on a volume functional unit basis, such as a cubic meter of product, are not relevant. Wood structures also allow for architectural forms that are not feasible with other building materials. To enable a comparison between wood and steel, we have assessed the Life Cycle Carbon Footprint of complete non-residential building structures. This building frame was initially planned to be made from steel, but the architecture was modified to integrate glued laminated timber beams. The structural engineers provided material balance changes. The results show a significant reduction in greenhouse gas emissions for structures using wood as a building material.
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