This thesis is focused on the method of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) in Waste Management in the Czech Republic. The aim of this work is creation of landfill model and evaluate the main material, energy and elementary streams with influence on the environment. The output is an overview of each impact indicator, assessment most affected environmental categories by landfilling. and where is appropriate the optimization. The thesis consists of two parts, theoretical and experimental. The theoretical part deals generally about LCA, landfilling and municipal waste, their production and the possibilities of further handling them. In the experimental part is evaluated and compare the impact of 1 tonne lanfilling waste per 1 calendar year on several Czech landfills. The next was created average landfill model and its comparison with database models. Key words Landfill, Life Cycle Assessment, Waste Management, Municipal solid waste

Treating water in order to reduce human and environmental risks requires the use of electricity and chemicals, the generation of which creates emissions of air pollutants such as NOx, SO2, PM2.5, and CO2. Emissions of air pollutants establishes a health and environmental risk tradeoff between air and water pollution. Addressing air-water tradeoffs by adopting a one environment framework requires new methods for quantifying these tradeoffs, new technologies to minimize air-water tradeoffs, and new tools for decision makers to incorporate these tradeoffs into compliance decisions. In my thesis, I develop methods for quantifying damages from air emissions associated with water treatment; assess the feasibility of forward osmosis (FO), a technology which holds the promise to avoid air-water tradeoffs; and create a tool to holistically assess compliance with air and water emission standards for coal-fired power plants (CFPPs). I start my thesis by creating a method to quantify the damages caused by the air emissions that resulting from the treatment of drinking water (Chapter 2), municipal wastewater (Chapter 3), and flue gas desulfurization (FGD) wastewater (Chapter 4). These studies use life-cycle models of energy and chemical consumption for individual water treatment unit processes in order to estimate embedded emissions of criteria air pollutants and greenhouse gasses per cubic meter of treated water. Damages from these additional air emissions are assessed and incorporated into benefit-cost analyses. I find that for drinking water rules, the net benefit of currently implemented rules remains positive but the promises of net benefits for some proposed rules are conditional on the compliance technology that is selected. For municipal wastewater, I find that while there are ~$240 million (in 2012 USD) benefits in air emission reduction from installing biogas-fueled electricity generation nationwide, there are several states where biogas-fueled electricity creates more air emissions than it displaces. For FGD wastewater treatment, I find that complying with the effluent limitation guidelines has an expected ratio of benefits to cost of1.7-1.8, with damages concentrated in regions with large chemical manufacturing industries or electricity grids that are heavily reliant on coal. In the next part of the thesis, I assess the techno-economic feasibility of power plant waste heat driven FO to reduce the air emissions associated with FGD wastewater treatment. In Chapter 5, I assess the quantity, quality and the spatial and temporal availability of waste heat from US coal, nuclear, and natural gas power plants. I find that while 18.9 billion GJ of potentially recoverable waste heat is discharged into the environment, only 900 million GJ of that heat is from the flue gas and is at a temperature high enough to drive water purification using forward osmosis (FO). In Chapter 6, I build a model of FO to assess its thermal energy consumption and find that the 900 million GJ of waste heat produced at coal and natural gas power plants is sufficient to meet their boiler feedwater and FGD wastewater treatment needs. In Chapter 7, I incorporate cost into the energy consumption model of FO, and conclude that treatment of FGD and gasification wastewater using waste heat driven FO is economically competitive with mechanical vapor recompression. In Chapter 8, I create an energy-balance model of a CFPP and nine environmental control technologies for compliance with FGD wastewater and carbon capture regulations. I use this model to maximize plant revenue at the National Energy Technology Laboratory’s 550 MW model CFPP without carbon capture. I find that revenue is maximized by using residual heat for water treatment or carbon capture. If both carbon capture and zero liquid discharge water treatment regulatory standards are in place, I conclude that the plant maximizes revenue by allocating residual heat and steam to amine-based carbon capture and electricity to mechanical vapor recompression for FGD wastewater treatment.

The aim of this research has been to identify the most sustainable options for electricity production in Mexico with an outlook to 2050. An integrated methodology for sustainability assessment of different electricity technologies and scenarios has been developed, taking into account environmental, economic and social aspects. The environmental impacts have been estimated using life cycle assessment; the economic costs considered include total capital and annualised costs while social aspects include security and diversity of energy supply, public acceptability, health and safety impacts and intergenerational issues. To help identify the most sustainable options, multi-criteria decision analysis has been used. The methodology has been applied to Mexican conditions for the assessment of both current and future electricity production. The results for the current situation show that on a life cycle basis 129 million tonnes of CO2 eq. are emitted annually from 225 TWh of electricity generated in Mexico. Heavy fuel oil, gas and coal power plants contribute together to 87% of CO2 eq. emissions. Total annualised costs are estimated at US$ 22.4 billion/yr with the fuel costs contributing 54%, mainly due to the operation of gas and heavy fuel oil power plants. A range of future scenarios up to 2050 has been developed in an attempt to identify the most sustainable options. The development of the scenarios has been driven and informed by the national greenhouse gas emission reduction target of 50% by 2050 on the 2000 levels, translating to an 85% reduction from the power sector. The results show that the business as usual (BAU) scenario (with the highest contribution from fossil fuels) is the least sustainable option with the CO2 eq. emissions increasing by almost 300% and the annualised costs by 290% for a projected electricity demand of 813 TWh in 2050. Overall, the most sustainable scenarios are those with higher penetration of renewable energies (wind, solar and hydro) and nuclear power, as in Green, A-3 and C-3. For example, compared to the BAU scenarios, the CO2 eq. emissions reduce by 84%, 89% and 89%, respectively. Although renewable energy based scenarios require high capital costs, the total annualised costs even out over time due to lower fuel costs. The lowest annualised costs are for C-3 scenario, representing a 40% reduction on BAU. With respect to social issues, the BAU scenario is also the least preferred option with the highest risks related to security and diversity of supply, health and safety and climate change. The most sustainable options are scenarios A-3 and Green, with social barriers related to public acceptability, reliability of supply and availability of energy resource. Most critical aspects for scenario C-3 are health and safety risks, and intergenerational issues related to nuclear power. Therefore, the Mexican Government should aim to strengthen the current low carbon energy policies as well as put measures in place to encourage reducing the electricity demand. In the case of the energy policy driver focusing on climate change mitigation or annualised costs, scenarios A-3 and C-3 are the most sustainable options.

Integrated bio-refineries offer a potential for a more sustainable production of fuels and chemicals. However, the sustainability implications of integrated bio-refineries are still poorly understood. Therefore, this work aims to contribute towards a better understanding of the sustainability of these systems. For these purposes, a methodological framework has been developed to assess the sustainability of different 2nd generation feedstocks to produce bio-ethanol, energy, and platform chemicals using bio-chemical or thermo-chemical routes in an integrated bio-refinery.The methodology involves environmental, techno-economic, and social assessment of the bio-refinery supply chain. Life cycle assessment (LCA) is used for the environmental assessment. The economic assessment is carried out using life cycle costing (LCC) along side traditional economic indicators such as net present value and payback period. Social issues such as employment provision and health and safety are considered within the social sustainability assessment. The methodology has been applied to two case studies using the bio-chemical and the thermo-chemical conversion routes and four feedstocks: wheat straw, poplar, miscanthus and forest residue.For the conditions assumed in this work and per litre of ethanol produced, the LCA results indicate that the thermo-chemical conversion is more environmentally sustainable than the bio-chemical route for eight out of 11 environmental impacts considered. The LCA results also indicate that the main hot spot in the supply chain for both conversion routes is feedstock cultivation. The thermo-chemical route is economically more sustainable than the bio-chemical because of the lower capital and operating costs. From the social sustainability point of view, the results suggest that provision of employment would be higher in the bio-chemical route but so would the health and safety risks.

This research has assessed the environmental and economic sustainability of domestic micro-generation technologies under UK conditions as both individual technologies and as part of a range of future energy supply scenarios for the domestic sector extending to 2050. A life cycle approach has been used for both environmental and economic assessment considering the relevant sustainability impacts, which include global warming potential, the depletion of fossil fuels, human toxicity and life cycle cost. The micro-generation technologies studied were selected on the basis of their ability to contribute to current and future energy supply and also their suitability under UK conditions. These technologies were micro-wind, solar photovoltaics, micro-combined heat and power, heat pumps and solar thermal water heating. The technologies were compared with one another and with the incumbent technologies, which were grid electricity and natural gas condensing boilers. Three journal papers have been published as a result of this research. The evaluation of micro-generation technologies on a life cycle basis indicated that despite reducing certain environmental impacts, all technologies increased at least one and as many as eight environmental impacts compared to their current fossil-fuel alternatives. All micro-generation technologies would reduce global warming and fossil fuel depletion compared to conventional technologies, highlighting their potential to contribute to energy policy goals. However, they cannot currently compete with conventional technologies for capital cost, although their life cycle costs – taking into account incentives from schemes such as Feed-in Tariffs – can be competitive. Considering both environmental and economic implications suggested that Stirling engine micro-combined heat and power is one of the most sustainable options for heat and electricity generation. The results also suggested that heat pumps should not be receiving incentives from the Government due to their poor environmental performance. Four potential future energy supply scenarios for the UK domestic sector were studied extending to 2050. The scenarios varied in terms of the level of effort made to improve the environmental and economic sustainability of the sector. Scenario 1 involved no further implementation of micro-generation beyond 2009, increasing energy demand and a grid electricity dominated by fossil fuels. In contrast, Scenario 4 portrayed a future where there is 1 micro-generation technology per dwelling, a 50% reduction in demand and almost complete decarbonisation of the grid mix. The results indicated that a huge transformation of the sector is required to achieve the 80% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050. This would include halving energy demand, almost complete decarbonisation of grid electricity and the installation of a micro-generation unit in every dwelling. To conclude, despite the level of interest micro-generation is currently receiving, this work suggested their usage may not necessarily be as beneficial as some believe. Their use does reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fossil fuel consumption; however, to have any influence on energy policy goals this use would have to be widespread. Furthermore, reduced emissions will come at the expense of other environmental impacts. Finally, with a number of the technologies not yet cost competitive – even with incentives – the Government focus on measures to reduce demand and decarbonise the grid may prove to be a better option as this work suggested that energy policy goals could be achieved without high penetration of micro-generation.

All kinds of products have economic, social and environmental impact throughout their entire life cycle. Today’s growing need for electronic devices contributes to the increasing problem within these fields.  The aim of this study is to investigate and determine the impact of a chosen Teracom Group product from a sustainability perspective and to develop recommendations regarding how to proceed, in order to reduce the impact of products. This study is mainly focusing on the environmental aspect of the concept of sustainability. A life cycle assessment (LCA) of a set-top box (STB) is conducted based on chosen indicators by using the software SimaPro. The goal of the assessment is to identify the phases within the life cycle with largest environmental impact and contribute to Teracom Group’s further sustainable work. 18 impact categories are included to express emissions and use of natural resources. The result clearly shows that the production phase has the largest environmental impact within categories such as terrestrial acidification, human toxicity, freshwater ecotoxicity, marine ecotoxicity, urban land occupation and metal resource depletion. The use phase affects the environment foremost within climate change, ozone depletion, terrestrial ecotoxicity, ionising radiation, agricultural land use, natural land transformation and water depletion. Transports and the waste scenario only have a small effect on certain categories. The experiences of this study are discussed, demonstrating the difficulty in making an LCA in the position of being at the company purchasing products, not at the company manufacturing them. The company has previously not focused enough on sustainability regarding products. An LCA performed by the supplier would be more reliable due to a better possibility of collecting accurate data. Communication and cooperation between the company and its suppliers are key solutions. Higher requirements during procurement should be put on the products, including demands on performed LCAs with clearly described references and methods, critically review by a third party.

In this dissertation, we analyze the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of the Steam Sterilizer, popularly known as Autoclave. The LCA will help Getinge Sterilization AB to identify the stages of the life cycle of Autoclave model GSS-P 91413, which contributes more to the environmental footprint. We use the ISO 14040 LCA framework to conduct the Cradle to Grave boundary study of the Autoclave. The results have shown the use phase to be a dominant phase with almost 84% of carbon footprint. For Getinge to produce sustainable products and reach its long-term goal of becoming carbon neutral, they need to reduce its environmental footprint in every phase of the product life cycle. Thus, this report suggests the best way that the company can impact the changes to the users even though they have very little control over it. The results were obtained using the Sustainable Minds (SM 2013) software, which is ISO certified, henceforth the results are trustworthy. This Thesis has 8 parts: Introduction, Method, Theory, Results, Conclusion, Critical Review, References, and Appendices.

El desarrollo de procesos químicos eficientes, tanto desde un punto de vista económico como desde un punto de vista ambiental, es uno de los objetivos principales de la Ingeniería Química. Para conseguir este propósito, durante los últimos años, se están empleando herramientas avanzadas para el diseño, simulación, optimización y síntesis de procesos químicos, las cuales permiten obtener procesos más eficientes y con el menor impacto ambiental posible. Uno de los aspectos más importantes a tener en cuenta para diseñar procesos más eficientes es la disminución del consumo energético. El consumo energético del sector industrial a nivel global representa aproximadamente el 22.2 % del consumo energético total, y dentro de este sector, la industria química representa alrededor del 27 %. Por lo tanto, el consumo energético de la industria química a nivel global constituye aproximadamente el 6 % de toda la energía consumida en el mundo. Además, teniendo en cuenta que la mayor parte de la energía consumida es generada principalmente a partir de combustibles fósiles, cualquier mejora de los procesos químicos que reduzca el consumo energético supondrá una reducción del impacto ambiental. El trabajo recopilado en esta Tesis Doctoral se ha llevado a cabo dentro del grupo de investigación COnCEPT, perteneciente al Instituto Universitario de Ingeniería de los Procesos Químicos de la Universidad de Alicante, durante los años 2014 y 2017. El objetivo principal de la presente Tesis Doctoral se centra en el desarrollo de herramientas y modelos de simulación y optimización de procesos químicos con el fin de mejorar la eficiencia energética de éstos, lo que conlleva a la disminución del impacto ambiental de los procesos. Más concretamente, esta Tesis Doctoral se compone de dos estudios principales, que son los objetivos concretos que se pretenden conseguir: - Estudio y evaluación de los modelos surrogados para la mejora en la optimización basada en simuladores de procesos químicos. - Desarrollo de nuevos modelos para la optimización de procesos químicos y la integración de energía simultánea, para redes de intercambiadores de calor.

The yearly production of shoes has, the last decades, increased by a significantly amount. The increased production have put pressure on the environment, and therefore it is important to decrease the environmental impact from the shoe industry. Icebug is a shoe company, that want to run their business with environmental sustainability and thereby they need to possess knowledge of their shoe production, and its environmental impacts. A method to estimate the environmental impact from products is the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) method. An LCA therefore have been performed for the shoe model Ivalo2 M Bugrip, one of the most sold models from Icebug. The result from the LCA show that the materials with the highest environmental impact was suede and rubber. The suede was the material with the highest environmental impact per weight unit. Therefore Icebug should decrease or replace the suede, with a material that has similar properties. The rubber was the most represented material within the shoe, and even if the environmental impact, per weight unit, was higher than most of the materials, Icebug should remain the rubber, because of its durability properties. The nylon plastic had high environmental impact, compared to the other plastics, whereby Icebug should decrease or replace the nylon. The environmental impact from the electricity was high. Therefore Icebug should try to decrease the energy consumption, and invest in renewable energy at the assembly factory. To decrease the resource depletion, recycled plastics and recycled rubber could be the best option. / <p>2018-12-11</p>

The building sector is a vital part in the progress towards environmental sustainability, because of its high potential to decrease the environmental impact. However, the building industry remains one of the most critical industries for the adoption of environmental sustainability principles, because of several unique characteristics in terms of e.g. long-lived products and many stakeholders involved. Environmental assessment tools have an important role to play in implementing environmental sustainability in the building sector, as they provide a clear declaration of what are considered the key environmental considerations and also provide a way of communicating these issues. The Environmental Load Profile (ELP) is a Swedish Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) based tool for the built environment, originally developed as an instrument for evaluation of the environmental performance of Hammarby Sjöstad (HS), a new city district in Stockholm, Sweden. The ELP is facing implementation, aiming to be established as an instrument of common acceptance. Experiences and results from the ELP has revealed that it can be applied to give a comprehensive picture of the environmental performance of a city district, but also that the tool has a number of weaknesses and there is much to improve in the practical procedures for the use of the tool in environmental assessments. This research project has the overall goal of making the ELP a stakeholder-accepted methodology for LCA-based assessment for the built environment. The overall goal includes two subgoals: (i) a research goal is to find an acceptable compromise in the design of the ELP tool between a natural science and technology based scientific accuracy and a social-science based acceptance of the tool and (ii) an implementation goal is to study and report experience from the use of the tool as developed today. The thesis consists of three papers: (i) the first is a study of two Swedish LCA-based tools for the built environment, which is based on comparative assessments using the ELP and EcoEffect (EE), (ii) the second is based on a questionnaire and interview study, in which we have investigated responses on LCA-based tools for the built environment among stakeholder representatives of Sweden’s building sector, with the purpose to identify barriers and opportunities for increased use of such tools and (iii) the third is based on case studies in HS using the ELP. We have identified the dominant environmental aspects in the ELP and also investigated the accuracy of the results. The study is completed with a development of a simplified version of the ELP, which also is applied in HS. Findings show that despite applying the comparative parts of the ELP and EE on an equal basis (i.e. the object specific data), differences in results were found. The following factors give rise to the differences: (i) differences in material grouping and life expectancy for the construction materials used, (ii) diverse Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) data and (iii) different impact assessment. The required level of knowledge to compare, analyse and evaluate assessments made with the ELP and EE, is relatively high, which creates an educational barrier towards increased tool use. A number of other barriers that could mitigate a fruitful implementation of LCA-based tools in Sweden’s building sector have also been identified. We have found barriers between: (i) the current and the desired environmental work within the sector, (ii) the knowledge of and the use of LCA-based tools and (iii) the developers of the tools and the potential users. Other barriers further identified are especially connected to: (i) data (availability and credibility), (ii) costs, (iii) time, (iv) customer pressure, (v) knowledge and (vi) incentives. We have also identified the following opportunities for increased use of the tools: (i) different design of the tools for different actors and situations, (ii) combine LCA with LCC, (iii) involve environmental assessment in the implementation of the EU Directive on energy performance of buildings, (iv) develop reference values, (v) simplify input-data collection, (vi) improve environmental labelling and (vii) provide incentives. In the development of a simplified ELP we have noticed that the most important aspects contributing to the environmental load at a city district level (50 % of the total amount), covers 91-99 % of the total environmental load. The thesis shows that different simplifications of the ELP-tool are required for different purposes, actors and situations. A simplified version of the ELP, “ELP-light” was developed and applied in HS. In the development of ELP-light, we have used some of the identified opportunities and bridged some of the identified barriers. / QC 20101105