Bridging Arctic environmental science and life cycle assessment: a preliminary assessment of regional scaling factors

Johnsen, Fredrik Moltu

doi:10.1007/s10098-014-0752-5

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 25 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Thus far, spatial differentiation life cycle impact assessment for the Arctic is still very limited, although LCA has been widely used for environmental assessment at continent, region and country levels. In a recent attempt to bridge Arctic environmental science and LCA, Johnsen [28] highlighted the importance of ecotoxicity, acidification, and soot/black carbon in Arctic LCAs, based on survey results from Arctic environmental scientists. To the authors' knowledge, no LCA is available in the literature focusing on the applicability of the currently available LCIA methods to the Arctic context and on what Arctic-specific features to be included in characterization modeling for future Arctic LCAs.…”

Section: Environmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Cycle Impact Assessment in the Arctic: Challenges and Research Needs

Pettersen

Song

2017

Sustainability

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Life cycle assessment (LCA) is increasingly used for environmental assessment of products and production processes to support environmental decision-making both worldwide and in the Arctic. However, there are several weaknesses in the impact assessment methodology in LCA, e.g., related to uncertainties of impact assessment results, absence of spatial differentiation in characterization modeling, and gaps in the coverage of impact pathways of different "archetypal" environments. Searching for a new resource base and areas for operation, marine and marine-based industries are continuously moving north, which underlines the need for better life cycle impact assessment in the Arctic, particularly to aid in industrial environmental management systems and stakeholder communications. This paper aims to investigate gaps and challenges in the application of the currently available impact assessment methods in the Arctic context. A simplified Arctic mining LCA case study was carried out to demonstrate the relevance of Arctic emissions at the midpoint and endpoint levels, as well as possible influences of the Arctic context on the impact assessment results. Results of this study showed that significant research gaps remain in Arctic-dependent life cycle impact assessment, particularly on: (i) the possible influences of the Arctic-specific features on characterization factors for impact assessment (such as seasonality, cold climate, precipitation, and marine dependence); and (ii) the coverage of impact pathways, especially on the under-addressed marine impacts and marine/near-shore dispersion processes. Addressing those identified research gaps and demand for future Arctic life cycle impact assessment could increase the credibility of LCA as an environmental decision-making support tool for Arctic industries and better support sustainable Arctic development.

show abstract

Section: Environmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Cycle Impact Assessment in the Arctic: Challenges and Research Needs

Pettersen

Song

2017

Sustainability

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…LCA was introduced and integrated into the Federal Government Environmentally Preferable Purchasing Program, in the Energy Independence and Security Act (lcacenter.org). As decision makers are increasingly required to take into account potential short-, medium-and longterm environmental impacts of projects (Yeheyis et al 2013), they more often use the LCA results during the investment projects (Johnsen 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmentally friendly pathways for the evaluation of investment projects using life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle cost analysis (LCCA)

Kulczycka

Smol

2015

Clean Techn Environ Policy

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Issues related to improvement in the quality of products and to environmental protection in the economic policy of many countries and in the strategies of institutions and international organisations (e.g. European Union) have increased in importance in recent years as a consequence of the increase in environmental awareness of consumers. All these institutions currently recommend a comprehensive assessment of the effectiveness of planned projects during the decision-making process taking into account both economic and environmental factors. It is, therefore, important to develop methods and tools to assess environmental performance as a support to a proper choice of investment activities. The aim of this paper is to develop algorithms to link the life cycle assessment (LCA) model associated with environmental issues and the life cycle cost analysis (LCCA) model associated with economic factors to permit an integrated assessment of investment projects. The combination of LCA and LCCA results enables the assessment of ongoing or planned investments and should be used as a priority in making strategic decisions. In this paper, three environmentally friendly pathways (algorithms) using LCA-LCCA indicators as a support for decision-making processes were proposed: the first for implementing any environmental investments, the second for modernisation and innovation investments, and the third for new investments.

show abstract

Comparative life cycle assessment of tailings management and energy scenarios for a copper ore mine: A case study in Northern Norway

Song

Pettersen

Pedersen

et al. 2017

Journal of Cleaner Production

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In support of continuous environmental improvement in the mining industry, it is important to systematically assess the environmental impacts of mining and mineral processing operations from a life cycle perspective. Although life cycle assessment (LCA) is widely used as an environmental systems analysis tool, the application of LCA in the mining industry is still in progress. This paper carried out a cradle-to-gate LCA of an underground copper ore mine planned in Northern Norway. Based on the ReCiPe midpoint (hierarchist) life cycle impact assessment method, results of the study showed that on-site electricity use, diesel for mining trucks and blasting dominated contributions across six, four and four, respectively, of the eighteen categories assessed, and metals leaching from tailings were the primary contributors to the human toxicity and marine ecotoxicity impacts. Compared to the baseline, results of the energy-oriented scenario analysis indicated that electrification of diesel-driven mining trucks would be more environmentally beneficial as long as across impact categories. While electrodialytic tailings remediation could extract up to 64% of copper in tailings prior to disposal and significantly reduce 2 the human toxicity impact of tailings, the marine ecotoxicity impact of tailings after electrodialysis changed inconsistently across the ReCiPe hierarchist and egalitarian perspectives. It is recommended to further assess the trade-off between the benefits of electrodialytic tailings remediation (extracting more copper) and the potential impacts of deposited tailings after electrodialysis from a multi-criteria decision-analysis perspective. In a generic context, this study provides an insight in further promoting LCA as an environmental decision-support tool, especially for comparing available cleaner production options, improving the overall environmental performance of a mine, and facilitating better communication with stakeholders.

show abstract

Bridging Arctic environmental science and life cycle assessment: a preliminary assessment of regional scaling factors

Cited by 3 publications

References 25 publications

Life Cycle Impact Assessment in the Arctic: Challenges and Research Needs

Life Cycle Impact Assessment in the Arctic: Challenges and Research Needs

Environmentally friendly pathways for the evaluation of investment projects using life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle cost analysis (LCCA)

Comparative life cycle assessment of tailings management and energy scenarios for a copper ore mine: A case study in Northern Norway

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About