•The Social Hotspot Database can be used to expand the systems boundaries.•Higher social risks on “Human rights” may be found after system boundaries expansion.•System boundaries expansion is useful ...to identify social hotspots in global supply chains.•Excellent scores may be given in involved organizations after system boundaries expansion.
MSocial Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA) uses a life cycle perspective to assess social impacts of products, and the S-LCA guidelines describe developing the system boundaries based on a factory-level perspective. However, such a perspective may exclude stakeholders with a negative social performance which are cooperating with a factory but are not directly involved with the product under study, and it can result in a step back on corporate social responsibility (CSR). Our study aimed to align S-LCA with the CSR concept. Therefore, we designed a case study for the manufacturing sector in which we practiced expanding the system boundaries of S-LCA. Our results showed larger social risks after expanding the system boundaries due to subsidiary and supplier companies located in countries with less strict regulations than the Netherlands, which is where the main organizations and parent company existed. We conclude that system boundaries expansion can result in more complete picture of the involved organizations, and lead practitioners to approach S-LCA with the goal of improving social conditions and identify companies which deserve excellent or poor social scores. Its usefulness is mostly expected when S-LCA practitioners aim to identify social hotspots in supply chains in socially sensitive markets.
•Common social hotspots of supply chains of case studies are: China, India and Congo.•Areas of concern were “Occupational accidents rate” and “Organizational support for community initiatives”.•SLCA ...is a useful tool for companies to improve corporate social sustainability.•The structure of Social Hotspot Database limits the hotspot analysis level results.
Environmental pollution, resource scarcity, and freshwater shortage are critical world challenges facing humanity. Process industry produces large amounts of brine, a waste water with a high salinity level and often critical raw materials. This study applies the social life cycle assessment (S-LCA) to quantify societal benefits and risks in developing brine treatment systems. S-LCA is implemented for hotspot and site-specific levels on four case studies of the Zero Brine project. Hotspot analysis focused on the major commodities. Social Hotspot Database was used as source for data and endpoint indicators. In addition, site-specific analysis regarded the social performance of the case studies companies; interviews and questionnaires were performed with representatives of the four case studies. The collected data were converted to scores with subcategory assessment method and performance reference points. The results show that for all case studies “Labor rights and decent work” and “Health and safety” indicators result in the largest impacts due to imports of commodities from developing countries. Site-specific results show that the overall social sustainability performance of the case study companies is at a good level. The only potential areas for improvement are the “Occupational accidents” and “Contribution to the local community”. The former are minimally higher for silica plant and higher for coal mine in relation to these sectors average accidents rates. Furthermore, the coal mine company can contribute more to the local community and reduce conflicts concerning environmental impacts at the city level. Common identified hotspots among the case studies are: China, India and Congo. Reducing imports from these countries will significantly improve the societal performance of the brine systems.
•The socio-economic aspects of plasma gasification were assessed.•A comparison to the conventional incineration option was performed.•A hybrid importance-fulfilment matrix combining different aspects ...was developed.•Plasma gasification depicted high capital costs while enabling higher revenues.•The technical aspects were the most significant and the social sphere ranked last.
Fossil fuels contribute to climate changes, negatively affecting the environment. Waste has been seen as a possible resource for energy production, constituting a cleaner alternative to replace non-renewable fuels through waste-to-energy (WtE) techniques. Plasma gasification is a procedure that decomposes the molecules at high temperatures, affording a synthetic gas (syngas) that can further produce electricity, fuels and chemicals. Within the most used WtE technologies, plasma gasification is recent and therefore not yet widely applied. Thus, a viability study to support the thorough understanding and implementation of this treatment is required.
This paper assesses the socio-economic aspects of plasma gasification promoting a more sustained waste management system, also taking advantage of the commodity assets granted by the technique. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time that an importance-fulfilment matrix is specifically developed to appraise the socio-economic viability of plasma gasification, combining environmental, technical, economic and social aspects. Although depicting high capital costs, plasma gasification enabled high revenues, rebating the operational costs. The sensitivity analysis exhibited a descending impact in the profitability of the plant for varying electricity sales price, landfill fee, discount rate, vitrified slag sales price and initial investment.
Catalonia is one of the most important world producers of cork, a natural material from which wine stoppers, champagne stoppers and derived products are produced. Within this process, approximately ...15% of the extracted raw cork ends up as forestry waste, while considerable shares of the processed cork are also considered cork residues, as for instance defective stoppers or agglomerate plates. Indeed, cork residues are usually sent to landfill with no recovery or second use.
In this study, gasification is used as a thermal strategy to convert cork wastes into energy, in order to demonstrate the valorisation of cork waste. This contributes to the implementation of the Waste Framework Directive (2008/98/CE) following the objectives and goals of the Roadmap for a Resource-Efficient Europe. Technological, R&D and industrial partners were gathered under the framework of the LIFE + Ecorkwaste Project and thus, a gasification plant with capacity to treat 15 kg of cork residues per day was designed. The ultimate goal was to develop and optimize the experimental procedure so that the gasification plant could be implemented at an industrial scale. In order to assess the environmental, techno-economic and social impacts of this technology, life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle cost (LCC) were performed, as well as a socio-economic matrix integrating various aspects of the technique was developed. The functional unit was the production of 1 MWh by means of cork valorisation through gasification technology and a comparison with the conventional scenario of using the national electricity grid was performed. Three scenarios of possible management strategies for the produced wastes were modelled for the LCA using Simapro Developer and two scenarios of different operation regimes were considered for the LCC under the CAPEX-OPEX concept. As main findings it was shown that the gasification strategy has a sustainable profile with lower environmental impacts than the conventional scheme of energy production. Moreover, this thermal scheme entails lower costs than the conventional scheme and allows net savings in the order of several hundred thousand €, for a 20-year lifespan of the plant.
•Gasification is used as a thermal strategy to convert cork wastes into energy.•Life cycle and cost analysis are rendered for environmental and economic appraisal.•Char valorisation depicted the most sustainable profile, amongst other scenarios.•Social features were infered wihin environmental, technical and economic aspects.•Landfill reduction and clean energy production supported circular economy.
Technological developments are opening new avenues to facilitate the circular economy through resource recovery from industrial wastewater. This paper presents the use of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) ...and Life Cycle Costing (LCC) in the development of technology solutions for the treatment of brine wastewater and recovery of by-products. Four industrial case studies are assessed that apply different innovative technology configurations, to treat the brines and recover the water, salts and mineral compounds. The assessment focusses on identifying hotspots and potential design improvements for the four case studies. In addition, the development of a unified approach for prospective LCA and LCC is illustrated to promote robustness and consistency in the analysis of the four systems. The analysis reveals that the impact and cost of treatment is highly dependent on the wastewater composition. Critically, whether the recovery of compounds and deionised water can counteract the impact and cost of the treatment systems. The early analysis suggests that this is possible for two of the cases studies. Estimates of the GHG emissions for the initial system analysis, range from 10 to 17 kg CO2e/m3, whilst costs range from €10/m3 to €25/m3. However, both are expected to decrease at full scale and are sensitive to costs of energy, chemicals and revenue from recovered by-products. The LCA's highlight chemical and energy consumption as critical hotspots. Design considerations therefore focus on the reduction of chemicals, reuse or switching to lower impact chemicals, and maximising by-product recovery, and using renewable energy.
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•Prospective LCA and LCC used at an early design stage are complementary.•Design recommendations are proposed based on the identified hotspots.•Chemical and energy consumption are critical factors in our prospective LCAs.•By-products with a high market value are crucial to reduce costs from chemicals.
Los tópicos del Estado de bienestar Toxo, Ignacio Fernández; Becerra, Santiago Niño; Delás, Jordi ...
El Ciervo,
11/2012, Letnik:
61, Številka:
738
Magazine Article
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