Application of life-cycle assessment on establishment and maintenance of amenity lawns

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1 Application of life-cycle assessment on establishment and maintenance of amenity lawns Oiva Niemeläinen and Frans Silvenius, MTT Agrifood Research Finland Sari Suomalainen, Häme University of Applied Sciences International Federation of Park and Recreation Administration European Congress 5-7 September, 2012 Basel, Switzerland

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4 General background Climate change Global warming Environmental awareness Concept of environment is wider than earlier

5 Global warming - Increased amounts of greenhouse gases in atmosphere - Can increase the temperature of the earth from two to six degrees - The changes in precipitation cause draught and floods - Is in global environmental impact class Eutrophication Local impact class: Finnish water systems like the Baltic Sea are very sensitive to eutrophication

6 Environmental awareness Increasing awareness on several factor which have impact on environment For example GHS effect on global warming Information can be got easily by internet Has become an important part of marketing

7 LCA IN LANDSCAPING PROJECT EU LIFE09 ENV FI Aims of the project To demonstrate different possibilities to use recycled based substrates in establishment and maintenance of lawn areas To develop methodology to use life cycle assessment in establishment and maintenance of lawn areas To produce cost-benefit comparisons for lawn areas utilizing conventional and recycled based substrates To demonstrate recycled based substrate products in landscaping

8 PROJECT S WORK PACKAGES 1. SPECIFICATIONS of lawn establishment and maintenance processes 2. DEMONSTRATION of use of recyclable materials in landscaping 3. Development of LCA tool 4. COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS 5. DISSEMINATION of obtained results and promotion of use of waste derived materials in landscaping

9 Examples of waste / recyclable materials Composted sewage sludge in growing substrate products Composted collected biowaste in growing substrate products Organic fertilizer products made of biogas digestate Residues of construction materials etc.waste Different kind of sludges e.g. from paper mills Use of removed soil from construction sites

10 Potential environmental impacts when recycled based substrates are used in landscaping Impact on the need of fertilizers Risks of nutrient leaching to water systems at establishment phase Energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions of composting and in establishment and maintenance of lawn areas Transportations of the materials and substrates Possible changes in soil s water holding capacity and impacts on irrigation demand Impacts on grass growth and coverage -> many factors have impacts on the results How the total ecological impacts of the whole product chain of recycled based substrates can be assessed?

11 Life cycle assessment (LCA) what is it? LCA = compilation and evaluation of the inputs, outputs and the potential environmental impacts of a product system throughout its life cycle (ISO 14040:2006)

12 Stages of a life cycle assessment 1) Goal and scope definition methodological issues defined 2) Inventory analysis data collection and calculation of emissions 3) Impact assessment assessment of environmental impacts 4) Interpretation assessment of the results in relations to the aims defined in goal and scope definition phase Iterative process, sometimes is inevitable to redefine for example goal and scope, when the investigation goes further Goal and scope definition Inventory analysis Impact assessment Interpretation

13 Life cycle assessment: To recognize potential environmental impacts of the life cycle of product and service To collect the input and output data related to the environmental impacts To assess the emissions the collected data to the inputs and outputs To aggregate the emissions in each impact class (eg. climate impact) To calculate he environmental impacts in a characterization phase The impacts are presented in relation to the functional unit of the product chain (can be e.g. one ha or kg of the studied product) Transparency is essential Assumptions, system boundaries and used methods have to be documented Standards ISO 14040/14044

14 Production of materials (peat, compost etc.) Fuel consumption and energy and water use Production of substrates Production of lime and fertilizers Establishment of lawn areas Greenhouse gas emissions Maintenance of lawn areas Ammonia emissions and nutrient leaching

15 Investigated parameters in each part of the product chain Electricity consumption Heat energy consumption and fuel consumption Emission factors of different energy types Material inputs and outputs Solid wastes Waste water Direct emissions to air and water systems

16 Data collection methods Experiments (fuel consumption of landscaping machinery, pot trials, demo areas) Scientific articles Expert interviews Questionnaires to stakeholders

17 Data collection methods 2 The nutrient leaching in connection to use of different substrates are assessed according to literature and expert opinions and on results obtained in pot trials The amounts of evaporated nitrous oxide and ammonia are measures based on pot trials The contents of hazardous components like heavy metals in substrates are going to be modeled based on analysis and trade descriptions Methane and nitrogen losses can also be calculated, when the concentrations are known in different product stages Fuel consumptions in establishment and maintenance of lawn areas are made by field experiments, interviews and literature surveys In addition, literature surveys are made concerning greenhouse gas emissions of substrate production chain, like in composting

18 Some emissions used in the calculations: Carbon dioxide CO2 Methane CH4 Nitrous oxide N2O Sulphur dioxide SO2 Nitrogen oxides NOx Carbon monoxide CO Ammonia NH3 Nitrogen to water systems N Phosphorus to water systems P

19 Impact classes of the investigation The following environmental impacts are calculated based on emissions and other material and energy flows: Primary energy, global warming potential, eutrophication of water systems, impacts of hazardous materials, acidification and water footprint: Calculation example Greenhouse gas emissions to CO 2 -equivalents: Carbon dioxide Methane (25xCO2) Nitrous oxide (298XCO2)

20 Some details As a test material the typical establishment and maintenance functions are studied Some variations are made by applying the calculations to different kinds of lawn areas and different environments in different areas of Finland (for example transport distances modeled) Also different seed mixtures and machines are studied

21 Expected results The system model is going to be used to define the most essential environmental indicators for sustainable substrate production and lawn establishment and maintenance. By using the results of the LCA-investigation it is possible to define the critical values in utilizing the recycled based materials in landscaping An LCA-tool is going to be published, which makes possible to compare different alternatives in establishment and maintenance of lawn areas It has already been found out that nitrous oxide emissions of substrate production and lawn maintenance contributes much to the carbon footprint It must be kept in mind that these nitrous oxide emissions occur in any case

22 Demonstrations 20 different demo areas are established The utilization of recycled based substrates are demonstrated Different lawn quality areas At 8 locations in Finland. The sizes of the demo areas varies. A couple of replications at each site Maintenance as at the surrounding lawn area The aim is to produce same kind of solutions in different ways Pot trials from MTT demo areas

23 Establishment of Lepaa demo area

24 HAMK Lepaa ja MTT Jokioinen Lawn demo areas (3 replicates) Substrates (20 cm): Three different compost-based growing substrates Seeds: Three different seed mixtures with varying mowing demand

25 Ground cover development (0-100 %) at Lepaa demosite in summer 2011 (establishment was on ). Three substrates (Ka) and three seed mixtures (Ss) Ka A Ss 1 Ka A Ss 2 Ka A Ss 3 Ka B Ss 1 Ka B Ss 2 Ka B Ss 3 Ka C Ss 1 Ka C Ss 2 Ka C Ss 3

26 Lepaa dry matter yield g/m 2 at mowing Mowing Three substrates (A, B, C) and three seed mixtures (Ss 1, 2, 3). Mowing Ss 1 Ss 2 15 Ss 1 Ss 2 10 Ss 3 10 Ss A B C 0 A B C

27 Kirjurinluoto demo site on 9.5. and in Pori city.

28 MTT Agrifood Research at Jokioinen studies by pot trials e.g. leaching of nutrients and green house gases exchange. In addition studies on fuel consumption in mowing are carried out.

29 Pot trials In pot trials such effects which are difficult to assess in field trials are studied Nutrient leaching Green house gas emissions GHS measurements of pot trials

30 In cost-benefit analysis work package the effect of use of recycle based substrates in establishment and maintenance of lawn areas is studied from Environmental point of view Socio-economic point of view Economic point of view

31 LCA IN LANDSCAPING PROJECT PARTNERS: COLLABORATORS: LIFE09 ENV FI project has got financial support from EU LIFE+ programme.

32 The project will run until August Also project colleagues Sari Suomalainen from Häme University of Applied Sciences and Pekka Leskinen from the Finnish Association of Landscaping Industries participate in this IFPRA2012 Congress and are ready to tell about the project during the congress. Thank you for your attention!