CHNAES-00521; No of Pages 6

Acta Ecologica Sinica xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

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Acta Ecologica Sinica

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/chnaes

A novel perspective to bitumen refineries life cycle assessment and processes emissions
Saeed Morsali
Gazi University, Faculty of Applied Science, Department of Environmental Science, Ankara, Turkey

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This study provides an introduction and a novel view of the impacts of oil refineries industry on human health,
Received 16 February 2017 ecosystem quality and resources. The scope and issues for dealing with these challenges are rather wide and com-
Received in revised form 27 July 2017 plex because the Oil refineries are complex facilities. Several processes, such as distillation, vacuum distillation, or
Accepted 7 August 2017
steam reforming are required to produce a large variety of oil products such as gasoline, light fuel oil or bitumen.
Available online xxxx
The goals, perspectives and expectation for the environmental practice and control have changed dramatically
Keywords:
over the last couple of decades. Hence the required approach has to be multidisciplinary, based on established
Bitumen refinery LCA scientific concepts and sound engineering principles. The environmental impacts of oil refineries are assessed
Bitumen refineries emissions using the technique of life cycle assessment (LCA). In this paper, only the material production phase of the bitu-
Damage assessment of bitumen refineries men LCA is considered. To improve the quality of the LCA, a regionalized life cycle inventory (LCI) database for the
Environmental loads of bitumen LCA Oil refineries and commercial LCI databases are used to validate and model unit processes with an LCA software.
© 2017 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of Ecological Society of China.

1. Introduction An LCA is a measure of the environmental impacts of a product, pro-

The importance of quantifying the impact of products and services
on the environment is growing due to the recent changes in patterns
of climate, living, resources and ecosystem quality. Consumers and gov-
ernments are increasingly demanding information about the sustain-
ability of products and interest in comparing potential solutions based
upon scientific data is necessary in order to do this. Petroleum refining
is one of the largest industries in the oil producer's countries and a
vital part of the international economy [1]. However, potential environ-
mental hazards associated with refineries have caused increased con-
cern for communities in close proximity to them [1]. This paper
provides a new overview of the processes involved and potential envi-
ronmental hazards associated with petroleum refineries in terms of
three main impact categories; human health, resources and ecosystem
quality. More than 660 refineries, in 116 countries, are currently in op-
eration, producing N 85 million barrels of refined products per day [2]. It
is estimated that the current world use of bitumen is approximately 102
million tons per year. The primary use of bitumen is for paving and roof-
ing applications, 85% of all the bitumen is used as the binder in various
kind of asphalt pavements: pavements for roads, airports and parking
lots, About 10% of the bitumen is used for roofing. The rest of the bitu-
men, approximately 5% of the total is used for the variety of purposes,
each very small in volume. This sector is referred to as secondary uses
[3].
Fig. 1 shows estimated yearly bitumen production worldwide by
different area, it also represents bitumen applications by sector.
E-mail address: saeed.morsali@gazi.edu.tr.
cess or service during the course of its useful life. LCA studies indicate
the synergistic products are favorable from an environmental perspec-
tive [4]. LCA is a growing popular method in different fields of research
as it is being recognized that resource depletion and the emissions of
different potentially harmful substances are often a result of the activi-
ties in different life cycle stages of a product's life. LCA is a versatile
tool to investigate the environmental aspect of a product, a service, a
process or an activity by identifying and quantifying related input and
output flows utilized by the system and its delivered functional output
in a life cycle perspective [5]. Ideally, it includes all the processes associ-
ated with a product from its cradle-raw material extraction to its grave-
disposal [6]. LCA studies can help to assess and minimize the energy
usage, resources consumptıon and emissions to the environment by
provıdıng a better understanding of the systems. LCAs can also suggest
different alternatives for different phases or substances of a life cycle
of the system if we have different design alternatives. Unfortunately,
LCA has not yet been adopted by the industries. This could partly be ex-
plained by the lack of a technical tool that accurately represents all the
aspects of the bitumen production sector, differences in production
equipment, energy supplement, regional material extraction technolo-
gy, transportation differences and etc.
There are several published studies for assessing the impacts of re-
fineries. In the Venkatesh [7] “Uncertainty Analysis of Life Cycle Green-
house Gas Emissions from Petroleum-Based Fuels and Impacts on Low
Carbon Fuel Policies”, the main method for determining emissions out-
put comes from energy use and fixed energy emission values. The study
emphasizes energy use above all else and uses a system boundary that is
from well to wheel such that there is no breakdown between processes.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chnaes.2017.08.005
1872-2032/© 2017 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of Ecological Society of China.

Please cite this article as: S. Morsali, A novel perspective to bitumen refineries life cycle assessment and processes emissions, Acta Ecologica Sinica
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chnaes.2017.08.005
2 S. Morsali / Acta Ecologica Sinica xxx (2017) xxx–xxx
Fig. 1. Global bitumen use and application areas.
Additionally, the study comes from the United States and uses time se-
ries data that is from 1998 to 2008 respectively [8]. Another study that
follows the same energy input rubric is the study by Wang [9] “Alloca-
tion of Energy Use in Petroleum Refineries to Petroleum Products”
that analyzes energy usage. The Wang study uses the same model as
the Venkatesh study but it classifies the emissions by process which is
more clear, besides in this study the used data are from 1996 and
1999 within the geographical boundaries of the US which are sort of
old data. These studies are only focused on the CO2 emissions and are
based solely on energy inputs, these studies neglect all other emissions.
They offer a small glimpse of how different fuel types produce different
emissions but are not inclusive of all processes within a refinery. These
studies do not go into detail on petroleum processing, transportation
process, raw material extraction and waste flow over the bitumen
lifecycle. In this study, the analysis leads to product specific allocation
factors for energy, airborne and waterborne pollutants. Furthermore
working material consumption, additive requirements, production
waste, and infrastructure, the most important emissions and processes
are given by their impacts values.
2. Methods and inventory analysis
The purpose of this paper is to analyze petroleum refining and its im-
pacts on the environment. Many factors contribute to the consumption
patterns of bitumen including price, government legislation, infrastruc-
ture, technology among others. Production can be just as affected by
those factors but also by others such as labor strife, dwindling petro-
leum reserves, worldwide market price, profitability, seasonal demand
and much more [8].
2.1. LCA methodology
As mentioned LCA is a system for collating and determining the en-
vironmental loads of a product, service or a process through its full life
cycle, from cradle to grave. In international standardization, ISO 14040
series promote LCA as a technique to better understand and address
the possible environmental impacts associated with products (includ-
ing services) [10]. ISO 14040 defines the principles and framework of
LCA, and ISO 14044 gives more detailed requirements and guidelines
[10].
SimaPro is the most widely used LCA software. It has unique features
such as parameterized modeling and interactive results analysis. It uses
many LCA methods as well as databases to modeling a product based on
real experiments from Europe and USA. In this novel, we used a com-
mercial version of SimaPro 7.1 to validate the results. Unlike the men-
tioned studies in this paper, all airborne, waterborne and emissions to
the soil were listed based on the procedures. Database for emission fac-
tors for the Swiss and for the average Western European refinery are
used. Airborne emissions comprise CO, CO2, SO2, NOX, particulate mat-
ter, hydrocarbons (specified), acids and heavy metals (specified). Wa-
terborne pollutants comprise hydrocarbons (specified), and inorganic
substances (sulfates, phosphates and nitrate). Different production
Please cite this article as: S. Morsali, A novel perspective to bitumen refineries life cycle assessment and processes emissions, Acta Ecologica Sinica
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chnaes.2017.08.005
waste and their further treatment are distinguished. The environmental
impacts modeled include energy consumption and greenhouse gas
(GHG) emissions from oil refineries.
There are various LCA methodologies that can be applied. They have
different impact categories they cover, moreover they use different
methods to evaluation these impacts, various kind of indicators selec-
tion, and in their geographical focus. In this paper we used Eco-indicator
99 which includes 3 main impact categories;
Human health: under this category, we include the number and du-
ration of diseases and life years lost due to premature death from envi-
ronmental causes. The effects we include are climate change, ozone
layer depletion. Carcinogenic effects, respiratory effects and ionizing
(nuclear) radiation.
Ecosystem quality: under this category, we include the effect on spe-
cies diversity, especially for vascular plants and lower organisms. The ef-
fects we include are Ecotoxicity, acidification, eutrophication and land-
use.
Resources: under this category, we include the surplus energy need-
ed in the future to extract lower quality mineral and fossil resources.
The depletion of agricultural and bulk resources as sand and gravel is
considered under land use.
2.2. System boundaries
The model describes the production of oil products for energetic and
partly non-energetic uses and the production of thermal energy and
electricity in Switzerland and Western Europe. The inventory tables
for oil products include oil field exploration, crude oil production,
long-distance transportation, oil refining, regional distribution and the
use of oil products in domestic and industrial boilers, in power plants
and in spark ignition engines (of trucks, personal cars, excavator, loco-
motives, and ships).
This study covers the bitumen production chain, starting from raw
material extraction and ending with a bitumen product ready for deliv-
ery to a customer. The process is divided into four stages: crude oil ex-
traction, transport, production, and storage. A schematic description of
the system boundary is given in Fig. 2.
2.3. Inventory data
Inventory data for this study is taken from commercial Simapro 7.1
program database and the oil fuel chain, in particular, is divided into
the following process steps:
• Oil field exploration: Include emissions caused by drilling activities,
barite and bentonite consumption and the emissions of oily drilling
fluids into the sea (emission data for North Sea exploration is used).
• Crude oil production: The variation in drilling efforts and energy con-
sumption per barrel oil extracted from different regions is modeled.
• Long distance transportation: Distance is used according to the specif-
ic supply situation of Switzerland and Western Europe.
• Oil refining
 S. Morsali / Acta Ecologica Sinica xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 3

Fig. 2. System boundary for bitumen production.

• Regional distribution: Regional distribution includes storage in large
stock and the supply to the costumer. The requirements and emis-
sions during the regional distribution are considered. The infrastruc-
ture and the energy consumption for the movement of goods,
production waste and hydrocarbon emissions are included.
• Fuel oil boilers: Three different sizes of boilers are considered, namely
10KW, 100KW and 1 MW and also manufacturing of boilers including
tank room and the chimney is considered.
Fig. 3 shows the weighting analysis result for three main impact cat-
egories, as it is clear the resources impact category has the highest value.
It means in the bitumen refinery LCA resources category is the critical
category. For the overall analysis which includes all subcategories
Fig. 4 was given.
Fig. 4 represents all subcategories weighting analysis with Pt unit,
according to this figure, in bitumen life cycle, fossil fuels, respiratory or-
ganics and climate change have the highest impact value.

2.4. Weighting Analysis of 1-ton bitumen production
Eco-indicator 99 allows comparing the impact categories since they
have different units. This means that the impact category is divided by
the reference. A commonly used reference is the average yearly envi-
ronmental load in a country or continent, divided by the number of in-
habitants. However, the reference may be chosen freely. We could also
choose the environmental load of lighting a 60 W bulb for 1 h, 100 km of
transport by car or 1 l of milk [8×]. This can be useful to communicate
the results to non LCA experts, as you benchmark your own LCA against
something everybody can imagine. Simapro uses Pt unit to show these
impacts. The Pt unit used in eco indicator method defined as a dimen-
sionless value. The value of 1 Pt means one thousandth of the yearly en-
vironmental load of one average European inhabitant.
2.4.1. Resources
Mankind will always extract the best resources first, leaving the
lower quality resources for future extraction. The damage of resources
will be experienced by future generations, as they will have to use
more effort to extract remaining resources. This extra effort is expressed
as “surplus energy”.
As the Fig. 3 shows the highest impact category is the resources cat-
egory. Throughout the bitumen cradle to grave period any fossil fuel
consumption would be considered in this category since the bitumen
directly related to oil production it is reasonable that fossil fuels catego-
ry will have the highest impacts among all subcategories. Estimating all
the processes which involve fossil fuels usage required more detailed
study which is quite impossible to discuss in this study, however, for
the resources category Table 1 have been listed. This table shows the
priority of the process which has significant environmental loads.

Fig. 3. The weighting of 1-ton bitumen production.

Please cite this article as: S. Morsali, A novel perspective to bitumen refineries life cycle assessment and processes emissions, Acta Ecologica Sinica
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chnaes.2017.08.005
4 S. Morsali / Acta Ecologica Sinica xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

Fig. 4. The weighting of 1-ton bitumen production.

Table 1 shows processes which effect on resources during bitumen
lifecycle, the unit used for this table is MJ surplus which explained ear-
lier. According to this table crude oil production has the highest value in
resources impact category.
2.4.2. Human health
As it explained already human health impact category has different
kind of subcategories which all consider a various type of disease due
to bitumen production and consumption uses.
• Carcinogens: Carcinogenic effects due to emissions of carcinogenic
substances to air, water and soil.
• Respiratory organics: Respiratory effects resulting from summer
smog, due to emissions of organic substances to air, causing respirato-
ry effects.
• Respiratory inorganics: Respiratory effects resulting from winter
smog caused by emissions of dust, sulfur and nitrogen oxides to air.
• Climate change Damage: expressed in DALY/kg emission, resulting
from an increase of diseases and death caused by climate change.
• Radiation Damage: expressed in DALY/kg emission, resulting from ra-
dioactive radiation
• Ozone layer Damage: expressed in DALY/kg emission, due to in-
creased UV radiation as a result of emission of ozone depleting sub-
stances to air
Damage to human health expressed as the number of year life lost
and the number of years lived disabled. These are combined as Disability
Adjusted Life Years (DALYs), an index that is also used by the World
Bank and the WHO [4].
Table 2 listed most important processes which cause a different kind
of disease, all these processes have the certain effect on human health
during bitumen lifecycle. Diesel in diesel generator onshore, Petroleum
gas flaring and Residual oil in the refinery are the most important pro-
cesses in the human health category. During all these steps various sub-
stances release to the environment, Table 3 shows these substances.
Table 3 shows most important emissions from bitumen lifecycle as-
sessment, Nitrogen Oxides (NOx) are a family of gases that can cause a
number of serious health effects. One form of NOx, nitrogen dioxide, is
unhealthy to breathe, especially for children, the elderly, asthmatics
and people with the chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. NOx is
also a key component to the formation of ozone and photochemical ox-
idants. Breathing low levels of ozone, for example, can trigger asthma
attacks and other problems for people with pre-existing respiratory
problems [11]. These tiny particles cause effects on breathing and the
respiratory system, damage to lung tissue, and even premature death.
This gas releases from fossil fuels burning.
Table 2
Processes which effect human health during bitumen lifecycle.

No Process Unit Bitumen refinery

Table 1 1 Diesel in diesel generator onshore U DALY 0.0000839
Processes which contain any kind of resource usage. 2 Petroleum gas flaring U DALY 0.00007003
3 Residual oil in refinery furnace Europe U DALY 0.0000696
No Process Unit Bitumen refinery
4 Tanker oceanic ETH U DALY 0.00005963
1 Crude oil production onshore U MJ surplus 3640 5 Diesel in diesel generator offshore U DALY 0.00003943
2 Crude oil production offshore U MJ surplus 2930 6 Bitumen refinery Europe U DALY 0.00003615
3 Raw natural gas NL U MJ surplus 5.767 7 Residual oil Europe in boiler 1 MW U DALY 0.00003213
4 Raw natural gas GUS U MJ surplus 3.448 8 Refinery gas in furnace Europe U DALY 0.00002986
5 Coal from underground mine UCPTE U MJ surplus 2.719 9 Petroleum gas in gas turbine offshore U DALY 0.00001363
6 Raw natural gas Alg. U MJ surplus 1.228 10 Crude oil production onshore U DALY 1.191 E-5
7 Raw natural gas D U MJ surplus 1.164 11 Crude oil production offshore U DALY 0.00001145
8 Crude oil in drill tests U MJ surplus 1.065 12 Petroleum gas in gas turbine onshore U DALY 0.00001018
9 Raw natural gas N U MJ surplus 1.037 13 Petroleum gas blow off U DALY 0.000009426
10 Coal from open mine U MJ surplus 0.472 14 Lignite power plant in D U DALY 0.000008828
11 Coal from underground mine S-Africa U MJ surplus 0.253 15 Diesel in building equipment U DALY 0.000005747
12 Coal from underground mine E-Europe U MJ surplus 0.1776 16 Electricity oil I U DALY 0.000005693
13 Output gas turbine production sweet gas U MJ surplus 0.1132 17 Coal tailings in landfill U DALY 0.00000402
14 Coal from underground mine N-America U MJ surplus 0.08434 18 Coal power plant in E U DALY 0.00000367
15 Output flare production sweetgas U MJ surplus 0.06345 19 Coal power plant in D U DALY 0.00000357
16 Coal from underground mine Australia U MJ surplus 0.05787 20 Lignite power plant in Gr U DALY 0.000002941
17 Output gas turbine production sour gas U MJ surplus 0.01323 21 Truck 40! ETH U DALY 0.000002516
18 Crude lignite mine UCPTE U MJ surplus 0.00452 22 Lignite power plant in E U DALY 0.000002213
19 Output flare production sour gas U MJ surplus 0.004014 23 Freighter oceanic ETH U DALY 0.000001637

Please cite this article as: S. Morsali, A novel perspective to bitumen refineries life cycle assessment and processes emissions, Acta Ecologica Sinica
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chnaes.2017.08.005
 S. Morsali / Acta Ecologica Sinica xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 5

Table 3 Table 5
Emissions from bitumen life cycle assessment cause diseases. Damage assessment of 1-ton bitumen production and substances which effect on ecosys-
tem quality.
No Substance Compartment Unit Bitumen
refinery No Substance Compartment Unit Bitumen refinery

1 Remaining substances Air Pt 0.03723 1 Nitrogen oxides Air PDF'm2 yr 11.49

2 Nitrogen oxides Air Pt 4.644 2 Nickel Air PDF'm2 yr 7.751
3 Sulfur oxides Air Pt 3.685 3 Land use 11-111 Raw PDF'm2 yr 2.736
4 Carbon dioxide Air Pt 2.376 4 Sulfur oxides Air PDF'm2 yr 2.698
5 Particulates, b10 μm (stationary) Air Pt 1.806 5 Land use I I-IV Raw PDF'm2 yr 1.611
6 Methane Air Pt 0.4932 6 Land use 111-IV Raw PDF'm2 yr 1.297
7 NMVOC, non-methane volatile organic Air Pt 0.2676 7 Zinc Air PDF'm2 yr 0.789
compounds, unspecified origin 8 Cadmium Air PDF'm2 yr 0.382
8 Particulates, b10 μm (mobile) Water Pt 0.1946 9 Lead Air PDF'm2 yr 0.3082
9 Arsenic, ion Air Pt 0.1859 10 Chromium Air PDF'm2 yr 0.134
10 Cadmium Water Pt 0.1392 11 Copper Air PDF'm2 yr 0.1288
11 Cadmium, ion Air Pt 0.1222 12 Chromium, ion Water PDF'm2 yr 0.05413
12 Methane, bromotrifiuoro-, Halon 1301 Water Pt 0.05956 13 Nickel, ion Water PDF'm2 yr 0.04436
13 PAH, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons Air Pt 0.04733 14 Copper, ion Water PDF'm2 yr 0.03762
14 Radon-222 Air Pt 0.03979 15 Cadmium, ion Water PDF'm2 yr 0.03163
15 Dinitrogen monoxide Air Pt 0.0203 16 Zinc, ion Water PDF'm2 yr 0.02708
16 Arsenic Air Pt 0.01608 17 Land use IV-IV Raw PDF'm2 yr 0.02189
18 Chromium Soil PDF'm2 yr 0.01688
19 Arsenic Air PDF'm2 yr 0.01486
Sulfur dioxide (SO2) is often a local pollutant, especially in moist at- 20 Cadmium Soil PDF'm2 yr 0.01056
21 Mercury Air PDF'm2 yr 0.005566
mospheres. SO2 gas and particles cause respiratory illness and aggravate
22 Ammonia Air PDF'm2 yr 0.003769
existing heart disease. Sulfur dioxide released due to fossil burning such 23 Lead Water PDF'm2 yr 0.002451
as coal and oil. 24 Zinc Soil PDF'm2 yr 0.002314
Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas and main reason for global 25 Arsenic, ion Water PDF'm2 yr 0.001239
26 Toluene Water PDF'm2 yr 0.001005
warming, this gas is another product of fossil fuels burning.
27 Benzene Water PDF'm2 yr 0.0003357
Methane, another greenhouse gas releases from the transportation
as well as burning fossil fuels.
Arsenic releases by industrial processes such as mining, smelting on the environment that cannot be explained in this study but a list of
and coal-fired power plants all contribute to the presence of arsenic in substances which release could be shown in Table 5.
air, water and soil. The consequences of arsenic include death when ex- Table 5 shows all substances that have effects on ecosystem quality,
posures are high enough to cause poisoning and cancer. these materials are producing from 1-ton bitumen production in differ-
ent stages.
2.4.3. Ecosystem quality
Ecotoxicity Damage to ecosystem quality, as a result of emission of
3. Conclusion
ecotoxic substances to air, water and soil. Damage is expressed in Poten-
tially Affected Fraction (PAF) ∗ m2 ∗ year/kg emission and Acidification/
According to this novel paper in typical oil refineries, the most dam-
Eutrophication Damage to ecosystem quality, as a result of emission of
age impact occurs in resources category, in the case of Pt unit resources
acidifying substances to air, Damage is expressed in Potentially Disap-
category has 156.9 Pt units per 1-ton bitumen production, it means for
peared Fraction (PDF) ∗ m2 ∗ year/kg emission.
obtaining 1 kg crude oil it will take 42.6 MJ energy. From extraction
Table 4 shows most important processes for bitumen LCA, during
step to distribution bitumen in markets, the most released emissions
these processes many emission's releases which have a different effect
to the air are; nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides, carbon dioxide, nickel
and methane which all have cause respiratory diseases effects on
Table 4
human health as well as climate changes. In respiratory inorganic sub-
Processes which affect ecosystem quality during bitumen lifecycle. category using of diesel in diesel generators has the highest impact on
the environment which produces nitrogen oxides to the air. Petroleum
No Process Unit Bitumen refinery
gas flaring is another harmful process in bitumen LCA, Both these pro-
1 Residual oil in refinery furnace Europe U Pt 0.4348 cesses can be replaced with an environmental friend process such as
2 Tanker oceanic ETH U Pt 0.2768
using renewable energies as well as controlling the gas emissions to
3 Diesel in diesel generator onshore U Pt 0.2671
4 Petroleum gas flaring U Pt 0.2385 the atmosphere.
5 Uranium natural in concentrate U Pt 0.1648
6 Infra transport long distance U Pt 0.1605
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Please cite this article as: S. Morsali, A novel perspective to bitumen refineries life cycle assessment and processes emissions, Acta Ecologica Sinica
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chnaes.2017.08.005
6 S. Morsali / Acta Ecologica Sinica xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

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Please cite this article as: S. Morsali, A novel perspective to bitumen refineries life cycle assessment and processes emissions, Acta Ecologica Sinica
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chnaes.2017.08.005