Journal of Industrial Ecology最新文献

The emerging field of prospective life cycle assessment (pLCA) offers opportunities for evaluating the environmental impacts of possible future consumption shifts. One such shift involves a transition from meat-based to plant-forward diets, acknowledged to mitigate environmental impacts of the food system under present day conditions. Current diets are often meat intensive (“meat-based”), whilst “plant-forward” diets include mainly plant-based foods, encompassing flexitarian, vegetarian, and vegan diets. Here we illustrate the application of pLCA in a case study of meal options, implementing shared socio-economic pathway scenarios in the LCA background system to represent future production conditions. We assess the climate footprints and land-based biodiversity footprints of a typical meat-based meal in Germany and Indonesia compared to a plant-forward meal in both countries (i.e., four meals), now and in 2050. Our findings show that the plant-forward alternative maintains a lower impact per serving in all future scenarios. At the same time, the reduction in impact for the meat-based meals is more pronounced in future scenarios due to shifts in the agricultural system. Our findings highlight the importance of supply-side measures to produce lower-impact ingredients, complementing demand-side interventions to reshape food consumption. Results are further evaluated in cultural and nutritional contexts, highlighting the practical decision-making constraints faced by consumers. We find potential “leakage” effects in calories and nutrition when choosing a lower-impact, plant-forward meal. These leakage effects should be considered in future studies seeking to evaluate the environmental implications of meal substitutions in the context of broader dietary requirements.

Against the backdrop of urbanization and its environmental impacts, this study expands urban metabolism research by integrating knowledge from the ecosystem service (ES) concept. A framework was put forward to capitalize on ES knowledge in metabolic studies and material flow analysis in particular while supporting dynamic analysis of ES supply and demand flows through factors such as pressure, state, and drivers. This framework is tested in the city of Lima, Peru, to evaluate six ESs and express their contribution in a standard economy-wide material flow analysis of the city. Moreover, simulations were deployed to forecast spatiotemporal variations of resource flows and emissions until the year 2050. Findings indicate a gap between the city's ES demand and the availability of its local natural resources. Demand exceeds local supply ES flows in Lima, with the exception of surface water provision and cane-mats for construction materials, representing 141% and 128% of the total supply, respectively. However, they are projected to reduce by the year 2050: 19% and 22% respectively. Carbon sequestration supply represents 0.01% of the total demand (carbon emissions). Peri-urban agriculture production represents 4.3% of the total food consumption. Our findings offer a new perspective on the role of nature in cities and highlight the need to implement urban sustainability policies that can help overcome metabolic deficiencies while prioritizing resource efficiency, decarbonization, and conservation/generation of green infrastructure in the city.

One of the key challenges in conducting consequential life cycle assessment (LCA) is to identify and quantify what is likely to be affected by changes in market behavior—so-called marginal effects. Although the critical importance of uncertainty and sensitivity assessments in attributional LCA is recognized, they are rarely conducted in consequential studies. Thus, this paper aims to address two objectives: first, to examine the uncertainty and robustness of marginal effects in consequential LCA and second, to identify the most influential group of inputs contributing to the overall variance in climate change impact scores. To accomplish this, the study employs an enhanced consequential LCA framework that integrates a multiregional economic optimization model with consequential LCA tools. The framework is applied to assess the climate implications of a 6% increase in clinker substitution within average Eastern North American cement production by 2030, relative to 2020 levels. Through this framework, a Monte Carlo simulation is conducted to evaluate the dispersion of the results. Subsequently, a variance-based one-at-a-time sensitivity analysis is performed to rank the most influential groups of inputs affecting the robustness of result across macroeconomic, material flow, economic, transport, and consequential life cycle inventory databases. Afterward, a conceptual framework is proposed to guide practitioners in prioritizing areas for testing consequential LCA results based on region-specific information. This work aims to contribute to decision-makers' access to more reliable information to support the development of effective environmental regulatory measures.

Plastic additives are as essential as polymers to the production and performance of plastic materials. Additive content can vary in composition and functionality depending on the product, producer, application, and production method. Such variation may be a barrier to achieving high-quality recycling and planning for plastic circular economy futures. Yet, as found in Part I, although there is increasing awareness of the importance of additives in plastics, they are often poorly disclosed or only briefly discussed in life cycle assessments (LCAs). In part II, we focus on the inclusion of additives in plastic processes in the database most used in plastic LCAs to date (Ecoinvent) and find that additives have historically been omitted from plastic granulate data and in production processes in the evaluated database. Thus, many practitioners will need to separately include additives in their models of plastic life cycles. To support practitioners in this endeavor, we then assess the availability of the 13,587 additives identified in the recent UN Chemicals in Plastics Report across the three major LCI databases (CarbonMinds, Ecoinvent, and LCA for Experts [GaBi]). We find that databases currently cover only 1,209 of these additives. Moreover, we assert that transparency regarding additive inclusion in plastics datasets, availability of additive datasets, and additive data completeness are major barriers to additive inclusion in plastic LCAs. Thus, we recommend focusing on the development of additive datasets, and we provide a tool for the identification of additive dataset availability and data gaps to improve the quality of plastic LCAs.

Due to climate change and the urgent need to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of industrial processes, decarbonizing energy-intensive industries is highly important. In Europe, emissions trading is the main regulatory instrument providing incentives to replace conventional production facilities with low-carbon alternatives. Using the example of primary steelmaking, this study aims to evaluate the impacts of product benchmark revisions on the transformation of integrated steel mills. To this end, an optimization model for the strategic planning of economically favorable transformation pathways is developed. The model is combined with a prospective assessment of economic and climate impacts from steelmaking processes. By applying the model to a case study from Germany, legislative conditions in which steel manufacturers are encouraged to transform their production infrastructure are identified. Based on current regulations on product benchmarks for steelmaking, investments into low-carbon technologies are slowed down until allocations of emissions allowances expire. However, benchmark revisions have the potential to speed up transformation plans significantly. In the analyzed scenarios, the greenhouse gas emissions of primary steelmaking between 2024 and 2034 decreased by up to 15%. These results are further strengthened by sensitivity analyses on the main market influences. Hence, this study provides policy recommendations on favorable revisions of product benchmarks for primary steelmaking.

Despite the many benefits of greenhouses, it is challenging to meet their heating demand, as greenhouses belong to the most energy-intensive production systems in the agriculture sector. Industrial symbiosis can bring an effective solution by utilizing waste heat from other industries to meet the greenhouse heat demand. This study proposes an optimization framework by which optimum symbiotic relationships can be identified. For this aim, the spatial analysis is integrated into an optimization model, in which geographical, technical, and economic parameters are considered simultaneously to identify the optimal location for developing new agricultural greenhouses. The objective function is to minimize the heating costs, that is, the investment cost of piping and electricity cost for pumping heat-carrying fluid from supplier to demand. The model is applied to the case study of Switzerland, and currently existing municipal solid waste incinerators, cement production plants, and biogas plants are considered potential waste heat sources. Results show that the import of tomato, cucumber, and lettuce to Switzerland can theoretically be replaced by vegetable production in new waste-heat supplied greenhouses (zero import scenarios). Accounting for the economy of scale for pipeline investment costs leads to selecting large-scale greenhouses with a cost reduction of 37%. The optimization results suggest that 10% of the greenhouses needed to satisfy the total domestic demand for lettuce, tomato, and cucumber could be placed on a suitable land plot in the direct vicinity of a waste heat source, with low costs of waste heat supply.

There is growing environmental concern regarding the increasing quantity of packages in retail eCommerce. This study investigated the environmental impact of two returnable packaging formats, performing life cycle assessment (LCA) case studies based on the Canadian apparel eCommerce market. In case study 1, the brand owner sold and shipped its products to final consumers using an expendable mailer and a returnable mailer that was managed and supplied via the centralized model. In case study 2, the brand owner rented its products to final consumers and shipped them using an expendable corrugated paperboard box and a returnable box that was managed and supplied via the decentralized model. Comparative, contribution, and sensitivity analyses were conducted to analyze and compare the environmental performance of these packaging options. For case study 1, the LCA revealed that the returnable mailer had greater impact than the expandable mailer in 9 of the 10 environmental impact categories, even if the returnable mailer was reused for 40 cycles and the final consumer was in the same city as the brand owner; this was primarily due to the length of transportation. For case study 2, the returnable box had smaller environmental impact than the expendable corrugated paperboard box in 6 of the 10 environmental impact categories, even though the brand owner shipped packages to final consumers a cumulative distance of 9000 km from its starting location. The overall results imply that the environmental burden of returnable packaging is primarily affected by total trip distance and the number of reuses.

Industrial symbiosis can be seen as a collaborative process where actors jointly identify, develop, and maintain resource management innovations, primarily related to secondary material and energy flows, to reduce waste generation and increase resource efficiency. Although industrial symbiosis is commonly recognized and promoted as a process creating business values for involved businesses, knowledge of what kind of values are created and how remains unstructured—and possibly incomplete. This is problematic because, without wider considerations as to what business values can be created through industrial symbiosis, the concept may not garner sufficient support from businesses and policy makers. Therefore, this paper aims to develop and present a framework that captures the wide range of business value propositions of industrial symbiosis, including benefits and sacrifices, along with their enabling mechanisms. The framework was developed based on a synthesis of the literature and interviews with actors involved with existing industrial symbiosis networks and is divided into four domains: costs, revenues, risks, and soft values. Beyond providing an overview of industrial symbiosis business values, the framework has additional uses, such as assisting in negotiations of relationship governance terms, including pricing and compensation mechanisms.

Biodiversity loss, driven by human activities, significantly affects the environment, human societies, and economies. Using the extended multi-regional input–output (EEMRIO) and life cycle assessment (LCA) techniques, we offer insights into how these methodologies can be used to inform financial decisions related to biodiversity focusing on two key aspects: biodiversity impacts and ecosystem service dependencies. Our method combines spatially explicit characterization factors from LC-IMPACT with the Global Resource Input-Output Assesment (GLORIA) database to estimate biodiversity impacts. As a case study we assess the biodiversity impact of the MSCI All Country World Index (MSCI ACWI)  which consist of about 3000 large- and mid-sized companies, from 23 developed and 24 emerging countries. The results demonstrate that most of the biodiversity impact is caused in the Americas, followed by Asia, despite its low representation in the index's country weight (6%). Europe shows the least impact. These results emphasize the need to account for global supply chain linkages as products sold in one country might have significant biodiversity impacts elsewhere due to sourcing of production inputs. Second, our results identify the main determinants of the index's impact: land use, followed by water stress and climate change. Although most of the impact is localized in few sectors, the distinct characteristics of these sectors require industry-specific mitigation approaches. Finally, double materiality results show both, the influence companies have on biodiversity and the reciprocal effects. Companies neglecting these impacts risk financial setbacks, making it a crucial concern for investors.