Environmental Impacts of Food Products Investigated in Life Cycle Assessment

Dr. Niels Jungbluth, Sybille Bsser

ESU-services Ltd., Uster, Switzerland

ESU
Institute of Food, Nutrition and Health Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich - ETH Seminar , 13. April, 2010

Food and Environmental Impacts

?
37 MJ o f Energy for 1 kg of Tomatoe s

3500 Litre of Water for 1 kg of Chicken

r km f o 769 5 berry Str aw rt Yog hu

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Contents
Research questions and goals The method of life cycle assessment (LCA) Environmental impacts of food consumption Conclusions concerning food purchases from the consumers point of view Public interest Collaboration possibilities with ESU-services
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Consumer Choices in the Life Cycle of Food Products

Production, Transport, etc. 100% Choice of Product

Consumption phase:
Direct influence of the Consumer Mode of Transport

80%

64% 60% Storage

Household
Preparation

40% 3% 13% Eating 20% 10% 11% 0%

Recycling

Waste Management

Anteil Use am Share of Energy

(Uitdenbogerd et al.

Energieverbrauch
1998)

Pre-consumption often dominates the environmental impacts Life Page 4 cycle thinking necessary
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Life Cycle Assessment of Products

The Dairy chain

Dairy farm

Transport

Dairy

Transport

Retail

Transport

Consumer

Waste treatment

LCA network food, final document

LCA looks from cradle to grave (to gate) It accounts for resources (energy, water, land) and emissions to air, soil and water
Main stages to be distinguished:
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production distribution delivery - use phase - disposal www.esu-services.ch

Four stages of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) ISO-14040, 44 Standard

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Research Questions and Goals

What is a good environmental choice from the consumers' point of view when purchasing vegetables and meat? How can the environmental impacts be judged? Which characteristics of the products are important? Do single consumers differ with regard to the environmental impacts caused by their consumption patterns?
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Which questions to be answered? Levels of Consumer Decision Making (DML)

All need fields (mobility, nourishing) Need field nourishing: meat or vegetables? Product group: tomatoes or carrots? Variants of one product: organic or greenhouse tomatoes? One product: How is it packed? Processing: salad or cooked?
Page It 8 is www.esu-services.ch possible to address different types of questions, but not with one analysis

Modular LCA to assess Food Products

Purchase Product characteristics
ur lt e u c c ri ti Ag rac p

Modular LCA
Fodder Production Feed Production Animal Production Slaughter-House

al

ka ac

ng gi

Transports Packaging Production Food Industry

i ig Or

n
Distribution

e ns Co

i at rv

on n
Consumption Waste Management

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su on

o ti mp

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Inventory for the modular LCA

Balance of all emissions and resource uses Investigation of the most important product groups meat and vegetables Use of existing LCA studies as far as possible Agricultural inventory based on economic data Simplifications at all stages by modular approach Combination of module results for the full LCA Easy environmental assessment with a modular LCA for a range of
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food products

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Life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) methods

environmental impacts carbon footprint ecological (kg CO2-eq) footprint (m2a) ecological s carcity 2006 (UBP )

abiotic res ources , incl. water nuclear energy fos s il energy land occupation land trans formation climate change ozone depletion toxicity s ummer s mog acidification nutrification endocrine dis ruptors nois e, odour, litter ionis ing radiation was te (incl. radioactive was te)

Ecological The BAFUEcological has developed the to Swiss ecological scarcity 2006 for assessing easy to understand, low workload, Carbon Footprint: scarcity : footprint: Comprehensive, Easy understand, reflects Internationally Swiss policy accepted, targets, used Lower for environmental Page 11

e mis s ions

re s ource s

impacts of products, services and companies globally known, only two issues: CO2 and land www.esu-services.ch use assessment of products, workload, companies Not comprehensive and for the whole economy

Ecological Scarcity 2006

Result Weighting Characterisation Primary energy Biodiversity Climate change
eco points

Inventory
Crude oil Uranium Wood Land occupation Fresh water Carbon dioxide (CO2) HCFC SO2 NMVOC I-129 N total Endocrine disruptors Heavy metals Pesticides Hazardous waste Nuclear waste

Swiss environmental legal targets

Ozone depletion Acidification Cancer and hereditary e. Estrogene potential Effectiveness

Assessment of emissions to air, water and soil as well as resource uses

Page 12 Aggregation www.esu-services.ch of exchanges according to the environmental scarcity defined in Swiss politics

Environmental impacts of meat purchases

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Agricultural production dominates total impacts of meat products www.esu-services.ch

Impacts of vegetable purchases

All characteristics are important Air Page 14transports and heated greenhouse cause highest burdens
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Combination of Product Characteristics for Vegetables

4'000 eco-points per kg purchased 3'500 3'000 2'500 2'000 1'500 1'000 500 GH, Berne, fresh, plastic
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Origin Consumption Packaging Conservation Agriculture

9'700

IP - Integrated Production GH - Greenhouse CH - Switzerland EU - Europe DF - Deep Frozen Org. - Organic past. - pasteurized

IP, Berne, fresh, paper

IP, EU, DF, cardboard

IP, world, fresh, cardboard

Org., Berne, fresh, no packaging

Easy evaluation of consumption patterns

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Lasagne production and user behaviour

35'000 30'000

warm-up storage in the Household

25'000

transport (supermarket to household) distribution

Eco-points 2006 per kg lasagne

20'000

packaging lasagne production

15'000

10'000

5'000

beef, frozen, 400g standard

beef, chilled, 400g

vegetarian, frozen, 400g

beef, chilled, 400g microwave

beef, frozen, 400g long storage

Differences in production less obvious if full life cycle is evaluated

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Important differences in the use phase need to be addressed www.esu-services.ch

Importance of consumer decisions

Coffee consumption
0.20 0.18 0.16 0.14 kg CO2-Equivalents 0.12 0.10 0.08 0.06 0.04 0.02 0.00 Espresso Black Coffee White Coffee Black Instant Coffee White Instant Coffee
Espresso Black Coffee White Coffee Black Instant Coffee White Instant Coffee 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Coffee Production Transports (roastery to household) Retail Packaging Milk

Hot Water (Brewing)

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Packages are often less relevant than other consumer decisions www.esu-services.ch

environmental scarcity 2006 points per litre of water

600

Distribution of mineral water

Deposited waste Production Natural resources Energy resources Emission into top soil Emission into ground water

500

400

300

Emission into surface water Emission into air

200
Distribution Use phase Delivery

100

0
Sw is s Eu bo ro ttl gl in as pe g s an bo bo ttl ttl e, in re gl g f il as ls s PE ys bo te Tttl m w e, bo at on ttl er e, ebo 1. w ttl ay 5 e, l, 18 on .9 ew l, Tr ay re an fil Tr sp ls an or ys sp t ,l te or or m t, ry lo ,1 rry 00 >1 k Tr m 6t an ,1 sp 00 or 0 t, km H ra om il, 50 e tra 0k su ns m pe po rm rt, ar pa ke ss t H en om ge e r tra ca c co ns oo r ol po li n in rt, g, g, va in in n re co fri ld ge on r a ly to av bo r er ttl ag ed e m un in it er al in C H

Impacts of distribution vary considerably by point of sale

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Not feasible to assist comparisons without considering difference www.esu-services.ch

Indicators of food purchases City of Zurich

100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0%
ic al sc ar ci ty en er gy G W P ei gh va de m an d t lu e

snacks tea ice cream beverages coffee colonials frozen convenience poultry fish eggs dairy products bakery bread vegetables, prepared fresh vegetables meat
w

le

ec ol og

w ab

no nre ne

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Meat, milk and coffee are a hot spots for environmental impacts www.esu-services.ch

Canteen Meals:
comparison of vegetarian and meat based recipes
9000 8000

Meals at canteen kitchens: ecological scarcity 2006

cu m

ul at iv e

en e

rg y

starch side dish vegetable side dish

7000

6622 Pts.

main dish

6000 Ecopoints/Meal

5000

4000

1/3 for vegetarian

2085 Pts.

3000

2000

1000

0
chop of pork, lambstew veal sliced in mean meat chicken braised meat meals cream, and carrots, beef, french drumstick, carrots, vegetables, roesti courgette, fries roesti carrots, french fries french fries curry with vegetables and rice risotto lasagne wit spaetzle with vegetables vegetables tofu in cream, carrots, roesti mean vegetarian meals

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Vegetarian meals have considerable lower impacts

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Use of LCA for determining the embodied emissions of Switzerland

Trade statistics combined with Indicator results for single products based on LCA studies

Calculation of embodied emissions for all imports and exports to Switzerland

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Balance of Swiss embodied emissions for food products

7 6 5
07, coffee, tea, cocoa, spices 11, beverages 09, miscellaneous edible products 08, feeding stuff for animals

Mio. tonnes of CO2-eq in 2005

4 3 2 1 Import Export

06, sugars, sugar preparations and honey 05, vegetables and fruit 04, cereals and cereal preparations 03, fish, crustaceans, molluscs, etc. 02, dairy products and birds' eggs 01, meat and meat preparations 00, live animals

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Results for the nourishing sector

Imports of embodied greenhouse gas emissions are much higher than exports and add 9% to total direct Swiss emissions Animal products and transports with the air plane are important

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Overall importance of nutrition in total consumption of households

100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% energy demand climate change ecological scarcity services mobility health care housing, non-energy energy use in house clothing nutrition

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High environmental impacts compared to other consumption fields www.esu-services.ch

Conclusions for Food Consumption

All stages and environmental impacts of the life cycle should be considered for the assessment Eat vegetarian. Consumption of meat and animal products need to be reduced Air transported products should be avoided Buy seasonal. Less products from heated greenhouse should be bought Consider energy efficiency in the household Reduce wastage and overconsumption
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Public interest on LCA studies of food

High public interest allows to teach life cycle thinking Many people mix health aspects and environmental aspects when looking at food Sensations, even if wrong, are more interesting than confirmation of former research Detailed comparisons should be more interesting for producers and distributors than for consumers

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Influencing consumers behaviour

Knowledge is available for consumers LCA studies sometimes confusing if no clear result Lower options for reducing environmental impacts compared to other fields like mobility and housing People tend to follow the easy things and not the important things, e.g. recycling of packages instead reducing meat consumption Stress the points that are really important and not what is
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scientifically surprising

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ESU-services LCA food database

First work on cooking in India (1994-1995) Further development with Ph.D. thesis of Niels Jungbluth on meat and vegetable consumption in CH (1996-2000) Several projects of ESU-services for extension Today more than 700 datasets related to food Background data and methodology according to ecoinvent Data are sold for SimaPro or other software
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Overview on contents
Simplified agricultural production services: application of fertilizers Vegetables: spinach, salad, tomatoes, lettuce, potatoes, onions, asparagus, etc. Fruits: apples, strawberries, cherries, grapes, oranges, vine Animal products: pork, veal, beef, lamb, poultry, eggs Dairy products: butter, milk, milk powder, yoghurt, cheese
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Contents (Part 2)
Drinks: apple & orange juice, mineral water, tap water, beer, wine, milk, coffee Sweets: chocolate, ice cream Meals: roast, lasagne, goulash soup, comparison of domestic vs. imported or meat vs. vegetarian Household appliances: cooking stoves and ovens, microwaves, refrigerators, carbonisation devices, coffee machine Food consumption: packages, transports, cooking, consumption patterns Pet food: cat food

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Cooperation possibilities
Case studies on single food products Environmental management in food industry Evaluation of food consumption patterns Assessment of total environmental impacts in the food sector Review of LCA studies

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Granted, my car consumes a lot ... But, Your Californian asparagus needs also 5 liters per kg (in Switzerland)!

Today I can enjoy the local asparagus, But it took me 950 liters of oil to travel 18'777 km to California!

Keep the relevance of decisions in mind and do not get lost in details!
Download of the Ph.d. thesis www.jungbluth.de.vu Calculate the environmental impacts of Your food consumption www.ulme.ethz.ch Page 32 www.esu-services.ch