Desempenho ambiental da cana-de-açúcar: avaliação regional do ciclo de vida

Resumo: O setor sucroalcooleiro cumpre um papel estratégico para a segurança energética. Os produtos energéticos da cana-de-açúcar são responsáveis por 15,7% de toda a oferta de energia do país. Devido à importante participação do setor sucroalcooleiro na matriz energética brasileira e à crescente preocupação com os impactos ambientais, estudos de Avaliação de Ciclo de Vida tornam-se importantes para a análise do desempenho ambiental dos sistemas de produção de cana-de-açúcar. A elaboração de inventários de ciclo de vida (ICV) representativos é um grande desafio, considerando as diferentes regiões produtoras e suas características específicas de clima, solo e nível tecnológico. O objetivo deste trabalho foi elaborar inventários regionalizados da produção de cana-de-açúcar na região Centro-Sul do país. Além disso, foi gerado o perfil ambiental dos sistemas típicos das regiões produtoras de cana-de-açúcar. Foram utilizados dados do IDEA (2014) validados por especialistas do setor e compatibilizados para a composição de ICV médios. As emissões foram estimadas segundo Nemecek e Schnetzer (2011), Canals (2003) e Novaes et al. (2016). Analisando os resultados da avaliação de impacto ambiental normalizados, observou-se que, dentre as 14 categorias de impacto analisadas, as mais significativas foram Eutrofização de Água Doce, Toxicidade Humana e Formação de Material Particulado. Por fim, foi possível destacar a importância da elaboração destes ICVs regionalizados para melhor representar os processos agrícolas do setor canavieiro no Brasil e possibilitar avaliações mais confiáveis no âmbito da ACV. Abstract: The sugar ethanol industry plays a strategic role in energy security. Energy products of sugarcane account for 15.7% of the national energy matrix. Due to the important role of this sector in the Brazilian energy matrix and the growing concern about the environmental impacts, Life Cycle Assessment studies become important for analyzing the environmental performance of sugarcane production systems. The development of Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) representative is a big challenge, considering the different producing regions and their specific features of climate, soil and technological level. The main purpose of this study was to create regionalized inventories of sugarcane production in the South-Central region. Moreover, it was generated the environmental profile of the typical systems of the sugarcane producing regions. IDEA data were used (2014) validated by industry experts and matched to the composition of average LCI. The emissions were estimated according Nemecek and Schnetzer (2011), Canals (2003) and Novaes et al. (2016). Analyzing the results of the environmental impact assessment, normalized, it was observed that among the 14 impact categories analyzed, the most significant were Freshwater Eutrophication, Human Toxicity and Particulate Matter Formation. In conclusion, it was possible to highlight the importance of developing these regionalized life cycle inventories to better reflect the sugarcane sector in Brazil and to allow more reliable assessments under the scope of LCA

Enhancing life cycle impact assessment from climate science: Review of recent findings and recommendations for application to LCA

Since the Global Warming Potential (GWP) was first presented in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) First Assessment Report, the metric has been scrutinized and alternative metrics have been suggested. The IPCC Fifth Assessment Report gives a scientific assessment of the main recent findings from climate metrics research and provides the most up-to-date values for a subset of metrics and time horizons. The objectives of this paper are to perform a systematic review of available midpoint metrics (i.e. using an indicator situated in the middle of the cause-effect chain from emissions to climate change) for well-mixed greenhouse gases and near-term climate forcers based on the current literature, to provide recommendations for the development and use of characterization factors for climate change in life cycle assessment (LCA), and to identify research needs. This work is part of the ‘Global Guidance on Environmental Life Cycle Impact Assessment’ project held by the UNEP/SETAC Life Cycle Initiative and is intended to support a consensus finding workshop. In an LCA context, it can make sense to use several complementary metrics that serve different purposes, and from there get an understanding about the robustness of the LCA study to different perspectives and metrics. We propose a step-by-step approach to test the sensitivity of LCA results to different modelling choices and provide recommendations for specific issues such as the consideration of climate-carbon feedbacks and the inclusion of pollutants with cooling effects (negative metric values)

Bridging the gap between impact assessment methods and climate science

Life-cycle assessment and carbon footprint studies are widely used by decision makers to identify climate change mitigation options and priorities at corporate and public levels. These applications, including the vast majority of emission accounting schemes and policy frameworks, traditionally quantify climate impacts of human activities by aggregating greenhouse gas emissions into the so-called CO2-equivalents using the 100-year Global Warming Potential (GWP100) as the default emission metric. The practice was established in the early nineties and has not been coupled with progresses in climate science, other than simply updating numerical values for GWP100. We review the key insights from the literature surrounding climate science that are at odds with existing climate impact methods and we identify possible improvement options. Issues with the existing approach lie in the use of a single metric that cannot represent the climate system complexity for all possible research and policy contexts, and in the default exclusion of near-term climate forcers such as aerosols or ozone precursors and changes in the Earth’s energy balance associated with land cover changes. Failure to acknowledge the complexity of climate change drivers and the spatial and temporal heterogeneities of their climate system responses can lead to the deployment of suboptimal, and potentially even counterproductive, mitigation strategies. We argue for an active consideration of these aspects to bridge the gap between climate impact methods used in environmental impact analysis and climate science

RenovaBio: the Brazilian biofuels policy and its Carbon Intensity calculator.

Abstract: A customized LCA-based tool (RenovaCalc) was developed by a multidisciplinary team (specialists in LCA, LUC, GIS), to perform calculations and support the RenovaBio certification scheme. The structure of RenovaCalc is based on the attributional LCA approach of \ "well to wheels \" using energy allocation criteria for the calculation of the Sucarcane and Maize Alcohol, Biodiesel, Biomethane and Biojet grades. Background data (input carbon profiles, such as fertilizers, electricity, etc.) comes from Ecoinvent 3.1 and the IPCC emission and characterization factors

Evaluating the Sustainability of a Small-Scale Low-Input Organic Vegetable Supply System in the United Kingdom

www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainabilit