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

PARALLEL SESSION 6B: FISHIERIES, SOIL, AND EMERGY METHODS 8 th Int. Conference on LCA in the
Agri-Food Sector, 1-4 Oct 2012
508
Timeline analysis. This approach in fishery LCA acknowledges the existence of strong fluctuations
in the environmental burdens in pelagic fisheries. In fact, Ramos et al., (2011) proved the existence
of sharp variations during an 8-year period for the Cantabrian Atlantic mackerel fishery.
5. Best practices in fishing production systems
A set of common ground fundamentals can be seen found in fisheries LCA, regardless of the methodological
and non-methodological assumption of each specific case study. Therefore, a best practices protocol
is proposed in order to provide a basic inventory guideline for future studies, as well as a mechanism to
guarantee data completeness when assessing fisheries, transparency and reproducibility. Nevertheless, the
suggested protocol only analyses the fish extraction stage due to the complex supply chains existing once
fish is landed, the varied processing techniques that may be used or the limited amount of life cycle studies
concerning fish processing.
5.1. Recommendations for goal and scope
Goal and scope decisions are highly dependent on the approach the authors selected based on the specific
context of the study. However, it should be highlighted that when an allocation method is needed, the introduction
of new biophysical allocation methods, other than mass allocation, may constitute interesting milestones
in the near future (Pelletier and Tyedmers, 2011).
5.2. Recommendations for LCI
In order to carry out the environmental assessment a given fishery, the following life cycle inventory
(LCI) items, based on data retrieved from the evaluated studies, should allow LCA practitioners to develop a
comprehensive LCA study:
Table 1. Minimum required inventory items to perform an integrated LCA study for extractive fisheries.
Item Characteristics
Diesel production and consumption Further research on fuel breakdown needed to understand consumption patterns in vessels.
Gear production and use More research should be put into gear loss and ghost fishing.
Anti-fouling and boat paint Future research should determine new sources of potential burdens in this subsystem.
Cooling agents Recently highlighted as an important source of ozone layer and climate change emissions.
Ice production Deeper analysis linked to fuel use and ice production.
On-board processing Packaging resources, offal waste and fuel use linked to processing must be explored.
Vessel construction To date, very simplistic approach. Shi dock system could be analysed in future studies.
Seafloor damage Currently, based on land covered. Future perspectives: direct impact and quality.
Bait Further analysis must be done concerning the link between fleets regarding bait.
Captures and landings Comprehensive data regarding catches, including the landed, discarded, offal and slipped
fractions would help improve data quality.
LIFE CYCLE
INVENTORY (LCI)
Operational inputs of the vessel
Seafloor impacts
Captures and landings
On board processing of seafood
LIFE CYCLE INTERPRETATION:
Characterization results interpretation
Sensitivity analysis for seafood products
LCA+DEA analysis for multiple vessel fleets
GOAL AND SCOPE:
Function of the product system
Functional unit
Global Warming Potential (GWP)
Abiotic depletion potential (ADP)
Acidification potential (AP)
LIFE CYCLE IMPACT
ASSESSMENT (LCIA)
System boundaries
Allocation: economic or biophysical
Eutrophication potential (EP)
Ozone layer depletion Potential (ODP) Marine ecotoxocity potential (METP)
Biotic Resource Use (BRU)
Global Discard Index (GDI) and other FSI
Figure 1. Minimum requirements linked to LCA implementation in fishing systems. Source: Vázquez-Rowe
et al., 2012c.