RT Journal Article
T1 Life cycle assessment of the Spanish cement industry: 												Implementation of environmental-friendly solutions
A1 García-Gusano, Diego
A1 Herrera, Israel
A1 Garraín, Daniel
A1 Lechón, Yolanda
A1 Cabal, Helena
AB This study tries to find out the hotspots of the Spanish cement sector in 2010 by the life cycle assessment (LCA) and evaluates some improvement scenarios where best available technologies and substitution measures are taken into consideration. The document presents an environmental LCA of the cement production using the 2011 International Reference Life Cycle Data System method recommended by the European Commission. Attending to the clinker production by stage, fossil fuel combustion is the most important source in terms of impacts. Besides, limestone’s calcination is crucial attending to the climate change. Electricity consumption is also relevant both in human toxicity with cancer effects and freshwater eutrophication (FE). Accordingly, solutions deployed lead to reductions in different impact categories. Fossil fuel substitution scenario achieves to reduce 33 and 37 % photochemical ozone formation and acidification (A), while material substitution scenario leads to reduce 10–13 % each impact category. On the other hand, fossil fuel substitution scenario entails an increase of 10 % in FE. Considering the ideal case of applying all these improvements together, reductions go from 15 % in FE to 49 % in A, respectively. To face the problems derived from fossil fuel combustion, a fuel shift is needed to reach less contaminant options such as biomass and bio-waste. Material substitution is another good solution for the industry, but it requires a change in the demand and further research to ensure the properties of cement. Authors recommend taking into consideration the collateral increase of the FE due to the phosphates increase coming from the alternative fuels combustion.
SN 1618-954X
YR 2015
FD 2015-01
LK https://hdl.handle.net/11556/4800
UL https://hdl.handle.net/11556/4800
LA eng
NO García-Gusano , D , Herrera , I , Garraín , D , Lechón , Y & Cabal , H 2015 , ' Life cycle assessment of the Spanish cement industry : Implementation of environmental-friendly solutions ' , Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy , vol. 17 , no. 1 , pp. 59-73 . https://doi.org/10.1007/s10098-014-0757-0
NO Publisher Copyright: © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2014.
DS TECNALIA Publications
RD 2 sept 2024