Prospective environmental and economic assessment of solar-assisted thermal energy recovery from wastewater through a sequencing batch biofilter granular reactor

Muñoz, Iván; Portillo, Francisco; Rosiek, Sabina; Batlles, F.J.; Martínez-del-Río, Javier; Acasuso, Iñaki; Piergrossi, Valentina; Sanctis, Marco De; Chimienti, Silvia; Iaconi, Claudio Di

doi:10.1016/j.jclepro.2018.12.074

Cited by 25 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…Several authors highlight the importance of using different background data as these changes can have a considerable influence on the overall results [17,22,23,100]. Nevertheless, only two of the authors apply a consequential modeling approach to take future market developments into account [78,101]. However, Bergerson et al [102] and Buyle et al [20] state that it is crucial to describe the market and technological characteristics as they influence the outcome of a prospective LCA of emerging technologies.…”

Section: Scalingmentioning

confidence: 99%

How to Conduct Prospective Life Cycle Assessment for Emerging Technologies? A Systematic Review and Methodological Guidance

2020

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Emerging technologies are expected to contribute to environmental sustainable development. However, throughout the development of novel technologies, it is unknown whether emerging technologies can lead to reduced environmental impacts compared to a potentially displaced mature technology. Additionally, process steps suspected to be environmental hotspots can be improved by process engineers early in the development of the emerging technology. In order to determine the environmental impacts of emerging technologies at an early stage of development, prospective life cycle assessment (LCA) should be performed. However, consistency in prospective LCA methodology is lacking. Therefore, this article develops a framework for a prospective LCA in order to overcome the methodological inconsistencies regarding prospective LCAs. The methodological framework was developed using literature on prospective LCAs of emerging technologies, and therefore, a literature review on prospective LCAs was conducted. We found 44 case studies, four review papers, and 17 papers on methodological guidance. Three main challenges for conducting prospective LCAs are identified: Comparability, data, and uncertainty challenges. The issues in defining the aim, functionality, and system boundaries of the prospective LCAs, as well as problems with specifying LCIA methodologies, comprise the comparability challenge. Data availability, quality, and scaling are issues within the data challenge. Finally, uncertainty exists as an overarching challenge when applying a prospective LCA. These three challenges are especially crucial for the prospective assessment of emerging technologies. However, this review also shows that within the methodological papers and case studies, several approaches exist to tackle these challenges. These approaches were systematically summarized within a framework to give guidance on how to overcome the issues when conducting prospective LCAs of emerging technologies. Accordingly, this framework is useful for LCA practitioners who are analyzing early-stage technologies. Nevertheless, further research is needed to develop appropriate scale-up schemes and to include uncertainty analyses for a more in-depth interpretation of results.

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Section: Scalingmentioning

confidence: 99%

How to Conduct Prospective Life Cycle Assessment for Emerging Technologies? A Systematic Review and Methodological Guidance

2020

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“…The former assesses observed changes following a prior decision, while the latter aims at exploring how a current decision will change future flows. Still, to date, some studies define themselves as prospective LCAs when they mean to say they follow a consequential modelling approach [23,24]. A similar reasoning applies to dynamic LCA, a mode of LCA that is often associated with future states as well.…”

Section: Taxonomymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Food products - [54] Ethanol production from wheat straw 3-4 [55] Chlor-alkali electrolysis 3-4 - [56] Fullerene and carbon nanotubes 3-4 [57] Ethylene production from wood 7-8 [58] Membrane filtration system 3-4 [59] Antibacterial T-shirt 5 [11] Energy system 9+ [24] Wastewater treatment 5 [38] Power electronic inverter 9+ [37] Power electronic inverter 9+ [60] agriculture [61] But-1,3-diene 3-4 [62] Renewable energy technologies 9+ [63] Liquid phase batch reactions 3-4 + --n.s. [64] Self-cleaning coated float glass 4-5 [65] PV panels [66] Recycling CdTe PV [67] Caprolactam production 2 [68] Scale up of a generic plant 6-7 [69] Scale up of a generic plant 7-8 [70] LFP-CnF batteries 3-4 [29] Transport systems 9+ [17] Cellulose nanocrystal foam 3 and 4 [71] Bio-based plastics 3 [73] Electricity production 9+ - [74] Metal recovery from e-waste 2-3 [75] Metal recovery from e-waste 2-3 [27] Nanosilver T-shirts 3-4 and6-7 [26,76] PV panels 9+ [77] Ethylene production 4-6 - [78] Electric vehicles 9+ -…”

Section: Framework For Ex-ante Lcamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It is best known in the form of the four-step procedure of Weidema et al [81] which describes how to identify the long-term marginal suppliers in perfectly elastic markets. A few studies apply this approach [13,24,44]. Also, the industry cost-curve approach applied by Katelhön et al [55] strongly resembles the general principles of the work of Weidema et al [84].…”

Section: System Modelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Both studies focus on direct scaling of the processes, without making additional improvements or taking opportunities for industrial symbiosis into account. Muñoz et al [24] apply the process-based proxy technology transfer in an assessment of solar-assisted thermal energy recovery from wastewater. They find that the emerging technology will outperform the current practice from both an environmental and a financial point of view.…”

Section: Proxy Technology Transfer-process (Ptt P )mentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Future of Ex-Ante LCA? Lessons Learned and Practical Recommendations

et al. 2019

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Every decision-oriented life cycle assessment (LCAs) entails, at least to some extent, a future-oriented feature. However, apart from the ex-ante LCAs, the majority of LCA studies are retrospective in nature and do not explicitly account for possible future effects. In this review a generic theoretical framework is proposed as a guideline for ex-ante LCA. This framework includes the entire technology life cycle, from the early design phase up to continuous improvements of mature technologies, including their market penetration. The compatibility with commonly applied system models yields an additional aspect of the framework. Practical methods and procedures are categorised, based on how they incorporate future-oriented features in LCA. The results indicate that most of the ex-ante LCAs focus on emerging technologies that have already gone through some research cycles within narrowly defined system boundaries. There is a lack of attention given to technologies that are at a very early development stage, when all options are still open and can be explored at a low cost. It is also acknowledged that technological learning impacts the financial and environmental performance of mature production systems. Once technologies are entering the market, shifts in market composition can lead to substantial changes in environmental performance.

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