A Life Cycle Assessment of an Energy-Biochar Chain Involving a Gasification Plant in Italy

Simone Marzeddu, Andrea Cappelli, Andrea Ambrosio, María Alejandra Décima, Paolo Viotti and Maria Rosaria Boni
Additional contact information
Simone Marzeddu: Faculty of Civil and Industrial Engineering, Department of Civil, Constructional and Environmental Engineering (DICEA), Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy
Andrea Cappelli: Faculty of Civil and Industrial Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering Materials Environment (DICMA), Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy
Andrea Ambrosio: Faculty of Civil and Industrial Engineering, Department of Civil, Constructional and Environmental Engineering (DICEA), Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy
María Alejandra Décima: Faculty of Civil and Industrial Engineering, Department of Civil, Constructional and Environmental Engineering (DICEA), Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy
Paolo Viotti: Faculty of Civil and Industrial Engineering, Department of Civil, Constructional and Environmental Engineering (DICEA), Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy
Maria Rosaria Boni: Faculty of Civil and Industrial Engineering, Department of Civil, Constructional and Environmental Engineering (DICEA), Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy

Land, 2021, vol. 10, issue 11, 1-29

Abstract: Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a fundamental tool for evaluating the environmental and energy load of a production cycle. Its application to renewable energy production systems offers the possibility of identifying the environmental benefits of such processes—especially those related to the by-products of production processes (i.e., digestion or biochar). Biochar has received worldwide interest because of its potential uses in bioenergy production, due to its coproducts (bio-oil and syngas), as well as in global warming mitigation, sustainable agriculture, pollutant removal, and other uses. Biochar production and use of soil is a strategy for carbon sequestration that could contribute to the reduction of emissions, providing simultaneous benefits to soil and opportunities for bioenergy generation. However, to confirm all of biochar’s benefits, it is necessary to characterize the environmental and energy loads of the production cycle. In this work, soil carbon sequestration, nitrous oxide emissions, use of fertilizers, and use of water for irrigation have been considered in the biochar’s LCA, where the latter is used as a soil conditioner. Primary data taken from experiments and prior studies, as well as open-source available databases, were combined to evaluate the environmental impacts of energy production from biomass, as well as the biochar life cycle, including pre- and post-conversion processes. From the found results, it can be deduced that the use of gasification production of energy and biochar is an attractive strategy for mitigating the environmental impacts analyzed here—especially climate change, with a net decrease of about −8.3 × 10 3 kg CO 2 eq. Finally, this study highlighted strategic research developments that combine the specific characteristics of biochar and soil that need to be amended.

Keywords: agricultural land detection; biochar; environmental impacts; land-climate interaction; LCA; gasification; GWP; natural resources management; OpenLCA; pyrolisis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/10/11/1256/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/10/11/1256/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jlands:v:10:y:2021:i:11:p:1256-:d:680996

Access Statistics for this article

Land is currently edited by Ms. Carol Ma

More articles in Land from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().