LCA Food 2012 in Saint Malo, France! - Manifestations et colloques ...

PARALLEL SESSION 3B: PACKAGING 8 th Int. Conference on LCA in the
Agri-Food Sector, 1-4 Oct 2012
Recycling of aseptic milk packaging and reverse logistic chain
accounting
Anna Lúcia Mourad 1,* , Fernando von Zuben 2 , Eloísa E. Correia Garcia 1
1 CETEA – Packaging Technology Center / ITAL – Institute of Food Technology, Brazil
2 Tetra Pak, Brazil
Corresponding author. E-mail: anna@ital.sp.gov.br
ABSTRACT
The production of the liquid packaging board used for manufacture of aseptic milk packaging has been recently modernised. So, one
of the objectives of the present work is to incorporate this data in a previous study considering also its reverse logistic chain. Although
post-consumer packaging recycling is a goal pursued around the world, the methodological approach to calculate the environmental
changes based on an LCA are not always clearly explained. In this project it was used an open-loop with closed-loop
recycling procedure with expanded system boundaries to model the system. The following reductions were obtained for a 27% current
recycling rate compared to no recycling: 23% in global warming, 8% in abiotic depletion, 13% in acidification, 15% in photochemical
ozone creation, 11% in human toxicity and 8% in eutrophication measured by the functional unit of 1,000 litres of milk
packaging. It can be concluded from this project that recycling can still bring about environmental advantages.
Keywords: recycling model, post-consumer packaging, open-loop recycling, system expansion
1. Introduction
Recycling is one of the best options to reduce the environmental impact of products and this objective has
been pursued by Tetra Pak for the last two decades (Mourad et al., 2008a). As the production of the liquid
packaging board (LPB) used for manufacture of aseptic structure for milk packaging has been recently
modernised, one of the objectives of the present work is to measure the environmental benefits due to this
significant component. Actually, the reverse chain of milk aseptic packaging is well established and the
composite material is almost totally recovered. Cellulose fibre content is recovered by efficient modern
hydropulpers which are able to separate wood fibre from the residue of polyethylene / aluminium. The high
quality fibre is used to produce new paper products. The residue of PE/Al is partially converted into roof tiles
and sheets and partially processed by a plasma technology which breaks down the long polymer structure in
the short chain of hydrocarbons obtaining paraffin and also recovers the metal content in high purity
aluminium ingots. Although the agricultural phase is usually responsible by most of the environmental
impacts of the whole milk chain (Hospido et al., 2003, Berlin, 2002), beverage cartons has a significant
environmental impacts such as land use, summer smog and terrestrial eutrophication (Falkenstein et al.,
2010).
2. Methods
This study has been conducted in accordance with the recommendations and requirements for conducting life
cycle assessment studies set forth in ISO Standards 14040 (ISO 2006) and 14049 (ISO 2000).
2.1 Functional unit
The packaging material system studied was assessed by using a functional unit of 1,000 litres of milk packaging
consisting of Tetra Brik Aseptic (TBA) packages with a holding capacity of 1 litre each. The aseptic
package is a composite structure of liquid packaging board (LPB), polyethylene and aluminium.
2.2 Energy and virgin packaging materials data
In Brazil, electric energy for public utility services is produced by an interconnected system of electric
plants, mostly hydroelectric. Most of the energy used in oil refineries is generated from their own subproducts,
i.e. from fossil fuels. The main aspects (consumption and emission) related to the extraction and
production of fossil fuels (pre-combustion) such as diesel oil, fuel oil, coal, natural gas and liquefied petroleum
gas, have been included within the boundaries of the study. The data concerning the generation and
distribution of Brazilian electric energy were collected between 1997 and 1998 and updated in 2000. Sitespecific
data from 15 companies along with sector energy production data have been combined to build an
energy production model (Coltro et al., 2003).
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