Roland Hischier

Résumé/Abstract This paper presents a comparison of two formats for data documentation and exchange-EcoSpold and Sirii SPINE. In the beginning of September 2003 ecoinvent, the Swiss national Life-Cycle Inventory database, was publishedon the internet. Besides ...

Plastics play an increasingly important role in reaching the recovery and recycling rates defined in the European WEEE Directive. In a recent study we have determined the life cycle environmental impacts of post-consumer plastics production from mixed, plastics-rich WEEE treatment residues in the Central European plant of a market-leading plastics recycler, both from the perspective of the customers delivering the residues and the customers buying the obtained post-consumer recycled plastics. The results of our life cycle assessments, which were extensively tested with sensitivity analyses, show that from both perspectives plastics recycling is clearly superior to the alternatives considered in this study (i.e. municipal solid waste incineration (MSWI) and virgin plastics production). For the three ReCiPe endpoint damage categories, incineration in an MSWI plant results in an impact exceeding that of the examined plastics recycling facility each by about a factor of 4, and the produ...

A novel process was developed to isolate poly([R]-3-hydroxyoctanoate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate) (PHO) and poly([R]-3-hydroxy-ω-undecenoate-co-3-hydroxy-ω-nonenoate-co-3-hydroxy-ω-heptenoate) (PHUE) from Pseudomonas putida species. Methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE), ethyl acetate, acetone, and methylene chloride efficiently extracted PHO from freeze-dried biomass. The ratio of solvent to biomass was 15:1 (vol/wt). The nonchlorinated solvents required 18 h of extraction to achieve methylene chloride's yield of 15 wt % within 60 min. In the case of PHUE, the yield was 15-17 wt % after 60 min of extraction at room temperature, independently of the solvent used. MTBE performed best in life cycle assessment (LCA) if contamination of the environment is avoided. Filtration of the extract containing 8 wt % of raw polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) through activated charcoal revealed colorless polymers with less than one endotoxin unit/g. The ratio (v/v) of the solution to activated charcoal was 2:1. The loss (impurities and polymers) amounted up to 50 wt %.

ABSTRACT Purpose An life cycle assessment (LCA) study of a field emission display (FED) television device was established. The first objective of this study was to get an up-to-date and comprehensive picture by applying the latest developments in the area of LCA, especially concerning the use of nanoparticles. In its second part, the study shows a comparison with today’s display technologies (i.e. CRT, LCD, plasma) and the timely development of the assessment of a FED television device. Methods This LCA study covers the complete life cycle of a FED television device in accordance with the ISO 14040 standard, from the extraction of raw materials until the final end-of-life treatment in a European WEEE recycling system. Two different functional units were applied in this study: For the in-depth analysis of the FED television device, an entire device along its complete life cycle was considered as functional unit—for the subsequent comparison with today’s display technologies, “one square-inch of display during 1 h of active use” was used as an appropriate functional unit. Main data source for the FED device was patent information; ecoinvent was used as default background database. Results and discussion The in-depth analysis of this FED television device shows a clear dominance of the production phase (independently of the impact category). Within the production of such a device, the electronics part (i.e. the printed wiring boards) shows the highest contribution—while, even when focussing on the glass and its various coating layers only, the carbon nanotubes (CNTs) production has a very minor influence. The releases of CNTs during the End-of-Life treatment do not contribute in a relevant manner to the overall impact neither—even when focussing on the “ecotoxicity potential” by using conservative CFs reported for this type of releases. Last but not least, the comparison with the existing television display technologies shows that an FED device has an environmental advantage over all three other technologies using the above stated functional unit of “one square-inch of display during 1 h of active use”. Conclusions Traditional impact categories as well as the ecotoxicity factor results in clear environmental advantages for an FED television device when comparing it to the three display technologies used today. Concerning the general issue of evaluating applications of manufactured nanomaterials in LCA studies, this case study shows the high relevance of an adequate integration of nanoparticle releases into LCA studies in order to achieve an actually comprehensive evaluation.

ABSTRACT A new technology for the production of cellulose nanofibers from vegetable food waste has been developed. The fibers are liberated enzymatically, given a functionalized coating and oriented using spinning techniques. We performed a laboratory-scale life cycle assessment (LCA) to assess the various routes of the entire production process from an environmental perspective. The results indicate that the electrospinning process has a higher impact than the alternative wet spinning process under the conditions described. Furthermore, to improve the liberation process of the microfibrillated cellulose, the enzymatic treatment step requires development; this could be through optimization of energy use in the heating process, mainly by reducing heat loss and water use. A comparative LCA with the results of other published studies, using different starting materials and chemical processes to obtain nanocellulose, provides a deeper understanding of our processes. From this comparison, we conclude that our technology has the potential to become a competitive alternative, outperforming other nanocellulose technologies from an environmental perspective.

Résumé/Abstract This paper presents a comparison of two formats for data documentation and exchange-EcoSpold and Sirii SPINE. In the beginning of September 2003 ecoinvent, the Swiss national Life-Cycle Inventory database, was publishedon the internet. Besides ...

ABSTRACT Dear Reader, When we are writing these lines, the interest in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is on an all time high: Life Cycle Thinking plays a core role in the European Sustainable Consumption and Production policies, and European directives like the EuP directive make Ecodesign mandatory for entire branches. Many companies request Carbon Footprints for products and new standards are thus developed, referring strongly to the ISO LCA standards, yet simplifying the procedure, wherever possible. After a long period of existence in a niche, Type III EPD schemes based on LCA are suddenly gaining high momentum. LCA specialists with application experience are sought in industry, consulting and research worldwide. During the years the COST Action 530 was running, the situation was different and quite difficult: the forthcoming boom of LCA – along with all needs for human capacities, education, infrastructure etc – was already obvious to the experts themselves. But the national support for LCA research and education was reduced in many European countries, cutting down the manpower of research groups with a high visibility, level of excellence and long history or even wiping them away. This affected also the work of the COST Action 530: many national delegates or working group members had to change jobs to a new position in, or mostly out of, the area. What happened in the meantime? Why is there suddenly such a high interest in LCA and related tools, being considered as holistic and principally ‘right’ but too scientific and complex? The answer is quite simple: the question of sustainability has passed the tipping point, reaching new levels of importance in politics as well as corporate strategy and risk management. This was not driven by suddenly enlightened actors, but forced by the natural, economic and social environment. Climate change is considered as maybe the most serious challenge to our civilisation. Water is also considered a resource that is essential to preserve. Distortions in the resource prices are turning into existential risks not only for companies, but also for individuals thinking about food or oil prices. How to determine the Carbon Footprint of a product? What is the resource-, energy- or emissions- related cost risk for manufacturing companies? Which innovations, which new product designs can be successful in the future? The answers to all these questions can be based on LCA and related tools. The complexity of a systems approach is accepted, since decision makers learned that simplified approaches do not help anymore in today’s day and age. The application of LCA (or other tools) in practice is determined on the basis of the relation between the efforts to apply it and the value proposition: investments need to be minimised and the value of the outcomes maximised. In our context this means that the value proposition of LCA has risen due to the changed environment. What about the efforts side? Working on the ‘invest’ side was exactly the aim of COST 530, the technical annex to the MoU reads: “The aim is to broaden the application of LCA for sustainability oriented decision making in manufacturing industry and to improve its operational applicability through increased knowledge and advanced methods.” The reader will find essential findings of this mission of COST 530 in the second part of the book. The first part gives an actual and practical overview of the new LCA standards and also short introductions to LCA and related tools such as eco-design. It is rather meant as a practical guide than a scientific publication, and as such, fully in line with this part of the COST Action 530 mission: to foster application of LCA!

While Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) collection and recovery have significantly gained in importance all over Europe in the last 15years, comprehensive studies assessing the environmental loads and benefits of these systems still are not common. In this paper we present the results of a combined material flow analysis and life cycle assessment study, which aimed to calculate the overall environmental impacts of collection, pre-processing and end-processing for the existing Swiss WEEE collection and recovery systems, as well as of incineration and landfilling scenarios, in which the same amount of WEEE is either incinerated in a an MSWI plant or landfilled. According to the calculations based on the material flow data for the year 2009 and a new version of the ecoinvent life cycle inventory database (ecoinvent v2.01), collection, recovery and disposal result in significantly lower environmental impacts per t of WEEE for midpoint indicators such as global warming or ozone depletion and the endpoint indicator Eco-Indicator '99 points. A comparison between the environmental impacts of the WEEE recovery scenarios 2009 and 2004, both calculated with ecoinvent v2.01 data, shows that the impacts per t of WEEE in 2009 were slightly lower. This appears to be mainly due to the changes in the treatment of plastics (more recycling, less incineration). Compared to the overall environmental impacts of the recovery scenario 2004 obtained with an old version of ecoinvent (ecoinvent v1.1), the calculation with ecoinvent v2.01 results in an increase of the impacts by about 20%, which is primarily the consequence of a more adequate modeling of several WEEE fractions (e.g. metals, cables or CRT devices). In view of a further increase of the environmental benefits associated with the Swiss WEEE collection and recovery systems, the recovery of geochemically scarce metals should be further investigated, in particular.

ABSTRACT Purpose Numerous publications in the last years stressed the growing importance of nanotechnology in our society, highlighting both positive as well as in the negative topics. Life cycle assessment (LCA) is amongst the most established and best-developed tool in the area of product-related assessment. In order to use this tool in the area of nanotechnology, clear rules of how emissions of nanomaterials should be taken into account on the level of life cycle inventory (LCI) modelling are required—i.e. what elements and properties need to be reported for an emission of a nanomaterial. The objective of this paper is to describe such a framework for an adequate and comprehensive integration of releases of nanomaterials. Methods With a three-step method, additional properties are identified that are necessary for an adequate integration of releases of nanomaterials into LCA studies. Result and discussion In the first step, a comprehensive characterisation of the release of a nanomaterial is compiled—based on reviewing scientific publications, results from expert workshops and publications from public authorities and international organisations. In the second step, this comprehensive overview is refined to a list containing only those properties that are effectively relevant for LCA studies—i.e. properties that influence the impacts in the areas of human toxicity and ecotoxicity, respectively. For this, an academic approach is combined with a second, more practical, view point, resulting together in a prioritisation of this list of properties. Finally, in a third step, these findings are translated into the LCA language—by showing how such additional properties could be integrated into the current LCA data formats for a broader use by the LCA community. Conclusions As a compromise between scholarly knowledge and the (toxicological) reality, this paper presents a clear proposal of an LCI modelling framework for the integration of releases of nanomaterials in LCA studies. However, only the broad testing of this framework in various situations will show if the suggested simplifications and reductions keep the characterisation of releases of nanomaterials specific enough and/or if assessment is accurate enough. Therefore, a next step has to come from the impact assessment, by the development of characterisation factors as a function of size and shape of such releases.