LCA of EU beet sugar. Part I: Conducting a LCA of sugar production in the European Union

Abstract

With this study, CEFS provides an insider view, on what the significant environmental impacts of beet sugar production in the EU are & the method best suited for allocating specific impacts to the products of sugar beet processing. Data on sugar beet cultivation, transport and processing used were collected from 11 sugar companies and 18 countries (years 2008–2013). The obtained data were found to cover approximately 90% of EU beet sugar production (CEFS Sugar Statistics, 2013). A hotspot analysis was run over 15 environmental impacts via the testing of 4 different LCIA methodologies (ILCD, ReCiPe, Eco-scarcity and Impact 2002+). In order to derive methodological recommendations for the appropriate allocation method, the consultant performed a sensitivity analysis on the 11 products comparing 6 allocation methods and substitution according to in ISO 14040. The hotspot analysis showed that sugar beet cultivation phase had the largest share of total environmental impacts. Energy allocation was chosen as the appropriate methodology as it covered the entire product range of beet sugar production, carbonation lime being the only exception. The study was representative for the factory but it could not capture the variability of the cultivation scenarios in Europe. Moreover LCAs focus only on environmental sustainability and therefore cannot be recommended as trustworthy indicators of overall sustainability.

Integration of Genetic and Process Engineering for Optimized Rhamnolipid Production Using Pseudomonas putida

“…The used data (e.g., fermentation yields, conversion rates, aeration rates, and purge share) was provided by further project partners and originate from studies in the lab scale. Additional data was taken from databases (background processes; e.g., GaBi-DB, 2020 ), literature (e.g., Knoll, 2008 ; Spoerri and Thomas, 2014 ), statistical data (e.g., WVZ, 2020 ), or own calculations (e.g., tank design). For the life-cycle impact assessment (LCIA), the recommended methods of ILCD ( Pennington et al, 2010 ; Wolf et al, 2012 ) were applied and any normalization carried out was performed in line with PEF Pilot 1.09 [( Benini et al, 2014 ), person equivalents (PE) related to EU-27].…”

“…One PE represents the summarized emissions of an average yearly European citizen generated by consumption. Data for the supply of molasses or sugar beet pulp were taken from an existing LCA for sugar beet production and processing ( Spoerri and Thomas, 2014 ) and allocated by the economic value share of the substrate. An allocation ensures that environmental impacts from upstream processes are only added proportionately, as the used substrates are only one of several upstream chain products.…”

Biosurfactants' production with substrates from the sugar industry – environmental, cost, market, and social aspects

“…53,54 Noteworthy is the use of an existing LCA-study on the European sugar market, which included necessary data for modeling substrate supply. 55 After an update of the economic data, the flows and their economic values were used for an economic allocation (see ESI Table S1†), in order to count exclusively the burdens of the respective substrate.…”

“…Spoerri et al provided the data for this process stage. 55 An overview of the used and modied data (mass shares and updated economic values) is given in ESI Table S1. † The second stage "storage and preparation" depends on the substrate used and includes its preparation (e.g., shredding of SBP), storage, and infrastructure.…”