The keys to reduce environmental impacts of palm oil

Oil palm is largely criticised for its impact on the environment. According to Life Cycle Assessment studies, the agricultural stage proved to be a major contributor to most of the potential environmental impacts, notably global warming, eutrophication and acidification. Focusing on global warming impact, main contributors are land use change and peat cultivation, N-related GHG emissions from fertilisers and residues in the plantation and methane emissions from palm oil mill effluent (POME) treatment. Impact from POME can be drastically reduced if POME is used for composting or if the biogas from anaerobic treatment is captured with electricity recovery. However, the impact from the plantation establishment becomes overwhelming when forests or peatland areas are converted to palm plantations. Oil palm plantations have significantly driven deforestation in Indonesia, together with logging and mining. It remains the most important agricultural driver despite the governmental moratorium and the certification schemes in place since 2011 and 2007; respectively. In order to protect primary forests and peatlands, which is absolutely mandatory to avoid irreversible carbon and biodiversity losses, it is paramount to define a sustainable land planning at national and landscape levels, as well as to implement agroecological practices in the plantations in order to sustainably increase yields and limit further land clearing

Introduction to PalmGHG - The RSPO greenhouse gas calculator for oil palm products

PalmGHG has been developed by the RSPO Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Working Group 2. It is a spreadsheet that quantifies the major sources of emissions and sequestration for a palm oil mill and its supply base, including estates and outgrowers, and is compatible with standard international GHG accounting methodologies. The calculator is flexible, allowing for different crop rotation lengths and alternatives to the default values. It calculates the total net emissions per ha, allocates these to co-products, and expresses them as t CO2e/t palm product, e.g. crude palm oil (CPO). The calculations can be done on an annual basis: this allows for identification of principal emission sources for management purposes; regular reporting, internally to the company and externally to the supply chain; and monitoring. A pilot study has been carried out in 2011 on nine RSPO companies, to determine its ease of use, and suitability of PalmGHG as a management tool. Results from eight mills gave an average of 1.03t CO2e/t CPO, with a wide range of -0.07 to +2.46t CO2e/t CPO. Previous land use and the percentage of the area under peat were the main causes of the variation. PalmGHG readily allows manipulation of input data to test management interventions. Results of scenario testing are given for a set of dummy data. The results show that high emissions result from clearing logged forest or peat, and conversely that very low (negative) emissions result from clearing low biomass land such as grassland. Net emissions below 0.5t CO2e/t CPO can be obtained from a mature industry that is replanting palms and capturing methane and generating electricity from the biogas. Further modifications to PalmGHG are being made, to amend default values and include calculations for biodiesel and other co-products. The updated calculator will then be tested through peer review, and completed by simplifying procedures for data entry, and providing documentation. (Texte intégral

LCA of Palm Oil in Sumatra, Comparison of Cropping Systems

The agricultural sector is facing a huge increase in consumption patterns and food needs. This growth is likely to worsen the pressures on the local and global environments. The CIRAD, within the frame of the ADEME project called Agri-BALYSE, is in charge of assessing the environmental impacts of palm oil. The chosen methodology is Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). Today, Indonesia is the first world producer of palm oil. The Riau Province in Sumatra is one of the most dynamic regions in terms of palm oil production, and has therefore been chosen for our case study. The data inventory was carried out with the assistance of SMARTRI, the research center of PT-SMART. In the study area, diverse types of palm oil producers were identified and characterised in order to produce the relevant LCA for the diverse cropping systems. Data were collected in the field for the company and diverse types of smallholders, i.e. plasma, and independent smallholders with or without advices from the company on the agricultural management. We used SIMAPRO® to build up the LCAs and compare the environmental impacts of the different types of palm oil producers in Sumatra. We present here the preliminary results of the study. The functional unit was one metric ton of crude palm oil (CPO). The hierarchy of impacting cropping systems varied with the type of producers. Globally the Fresh Fruit Bunches (FFB) yields were lower per hectare for the independent smallholders and impacts per metric ton of CPO were larger. Despite the management advices that some independent smallholders received, their yields were still lower than those of the company probably due to non-selected plant materials. Further field data collection is still needed however, i) to survey more smallholders and insure the representativeness of modelled cropping systems, and ii) to gather more data on differential agricultural managements, notably on very diverse organic fertilizers used by smallholders. (Résumé d'auteur

PalmGHG, RSPO greenhouse gas calculator, scientific background

GHG emissions from palm plantations are a major environmental issue in main producing countries. Through its working groups, RSPO developed a GHG calculator, PalmGHG, which can help the producers to monitor the GHG emissions from their supply areas and mill units and establish reduction plans. In 2013, the use of PalmGHG (or an RSPO endorsed equivalent) has been integrated in the revised Principles & Criteria for the Production of Sustainable Palm Oil (P&C 2013), which created an emulation to tackle this GHG issue. This paper provides an overview of the development of PalmGHG and its various versions as well as explains the main characteristics, calculation assumptions and features

¿Como proteger el medio ambiente con la palma sostenible ?

Palm oil production has drastically increased in the last decades raising some concern in terms of environmental impacts, notably when it comes at the cost of deforestation. Environmental impacts can occur all along a value chain, so that assessment tools need to account for the whole production chain. Life cycle assessment is a standardised methodology allowing for the assessment of environmental impacts along a value chain. According to Life Cycle Assessment studies, the agricultural stage of palm oil production systems proved to be the major contributor to most of the potential environmental impacts, notably global warming, eutrophication and acidification. Focusing on global warming impact, main contributors are land use change and peat cultivation, GHG emissions from fertilisers and residues applied in the plantation and methane emissions from palm oil mill effluent (POME) treatment. Impact from POME can be significantly reduced if POME is used for composting or if the biogas from anaerobic treatment is captured with electricity recovery. However, the impact from the plantation establishment becomes overwhelming when non-degraded forests or peatland areas are converted to palm plantations. Together with logging, pulp and paper, and mining, oil palm plantations have driven deforestation in Indonesia. The development of palm plantations remains the most important agricultural driver of deforestation despite the governmental moratorium and the certification schemes, which have been in place since 2011 and 2007; respectively. In order to protect primary forests and peatlands – a mandatory step to avoid irreversible carbon and biodiversity losses, it is paramount to define a sustainable land planning at national and landscape levels, as well as to implement agroecological practices in the plantations in order to sustainably increase yields and limit further land clearing

Environmental assessment of bioethanol production from lignocellulosic crops

Novelty: A multi-scale approach using agro-ecosystem and landscape models is developed to calculate the emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG), especially N2O, related to crop and landscape management. This approach is used to improve the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of second generation biofuels. Context: 20% of fuel have to be produced from renewable origin in 2020, and meet a 50% decrease of GHG emission compared to fossil fuel (RED Directive, 2009/28/CE). Besides, agriculture represents 10 to 15% of GHG emissions in France and especially 65% of N2O emissions which have a huge global warming potential (310 times higher than CO2, according to IPCC 2007). Therefore, it is essential to carefully develop, evaluate and use relevant methods to assess the environmental balance of lignocellulosic crops (2nd generation biofuels). Even if they all demonstrate a net reduction in GHG emissions, LCA of 2nd generation biofuels do not present any common methodology (Cherubini and Stromman, 2011). Main differences during the crop cycle are due to the generic factors used to calculate GHG emissions and the lack of consideration for land use change. A multi-scale approach is required to fulfill a complete LCA. Indeed, GHG emissions are strongly bound with local pedo-climatic conditions and technological options (especially N application rates). This approach is used to estimate direct GHG emissions, downstream indirect GHG emissions and emissions due to land use change. Scope: The LCA is carried out for a lignocellulosic bio-ethanol industrial unit, located in France, supplied by a mixture of feedstocks: annual and dedicated crops (triticale and fiber sorghum), perennial crops (miscanthus and switchgrass), forest and crop residues (straw) and possibly short rotation coppice (SRC). The study focuses mainly on a supply area around the industrial unit located in the Champagne-Ardenne region. However, we aim at developing generic methods. Material and methods: The agro-ecosystem model CERES-EGC (Gabrielle et al., 2006) is used to simulate GHG emissions at plot scale (i.e., a few hectares). This model calculates direct emissions in relation to local soil and climate conditions. Downstream indirect emissions are simulated from the NitroScape model (Duretz et al. 2011), that accounts for hydrological and atmospheric transfers of reactive nitrogen between landscape elements (e.g., plots, farm buildings). That model works at a scale of typically a small watershed or a few (20-30) square kilometers and make it possible to estimate uncertainties made when considering only direct emissions. The CERES-EGC model will be possibly used at regional scale and combined with prospective scenarios of land use change from conventianl crops towards lignocellulosic crops. Results and discussion: The methodological approach for assessing LCA is currently under development. Primary results are expected for the end of 2011 (November). They should present LCA simulated at farm gate for a mixture of feedstock and integrated at plot and regional scales. Conclusion: This method is useful to reduce uncertainties in estimates of GHG emission, one of the steps that have important impact in biofuel LCA. Moreover it will be applied in the French project FUTUROL to assess the sustainability of a project of bio-ethanol production plant. (Résumé d'auteur