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

GROUP 3, SESSION A: LABELLING, CONSUMERS, DIET 8 th Int. Conference on LCA in the
Agri-Food Sector, 1-4 Oct 2012
The analysis of the environmental performance includes the assessment of the impact categories of Land Use
by using the Eco-indicator-99 (Land Use and Land Conversion) and IMPACT 2002+ (Land Occupation)
evaluation methods. For all these categories, over 90% of the total impact derives from the agricultural
phase. Then other indicators are analysed; the “Material subject for recycling or other use” category includes
pruning residues (agricultural phase), leaves and little branches (extraction phase) and recycled packaging
(glass, plastic and cardboard). The production of “Hazardous and environmentally active waste” is nil, as is
the production of toxic emissions. With regard to other types of waste, the wastewater deriving from the
extraction phase and the waste disposed in landfill (not recycled) must be indicated. Finally, pruning residues
and by-products of the olive oil extraction (leaves and little branches, pomace and pit) are included among
the waste that could be recovered as renewable energy.
The LCA study enables us to detect some improvements which could be adopted for the agricultural phase
(as reducing to the minimum the employment of non-renewable energy resources and water, preserve the
fertility of the soil or recovering the energy value of pruning residues, by the controlled burning carried out
in a boiler for the thermal energy production) and for the processes of olive oil extraction and packaging, (as
improving the management of waste and wastewater during the extraction phase or studying other types of
container). While in order to reduce the environmental impact of the end of life, efforts must be made to
improve the communication with consumers, by stating more information on the label, with the aim to guide
consumers towards sustainable methods of packaging disposal.
The critical analysis of PCR developed by the International EDP® System aims to elaborate some consideration
about the possibility of Italian firms adopting these rules or submitting to some modifications after the
expiry date (31 Dec 2013), on the basis of elements which are more representative of the Italian olive oil
industries. From this critical analysis we can assert that PCR could be adopted by the Italian olive oil firms
without any particular problems. As for the environmental performance developed in paragraph 10 of PCR,
some suggestions might be made in order to explain the impact of toxicity and land use better. The analysis
of toxicity would be more complete if the two toxicity categories developed by Ralph K. Rosenbaum et al. in
the UseTox method are considered (Ralph et al., 2008): Human Toxicity (expressed as no. of cases x kg) and
Freshwater Ecotoxicity (expressed as kg DCB-equiv.). These suggestions could be relevant in consideration
of the need to assess the toxicity for the processes in which there is an agricultural phase involving a high
impact in terms of toxicity, deriving from the use of pesticides.
In the same way, as for the land use categories, indicators could be better shown, as Baitz (2002) suggests,
by distinguishing: Erosion Resistance; Mechanical Filtration; Physicochemical Filtration; Groundwater Replenishment;
Biotic Production. Finally, some considerations regarding the CO2 balance; to achieve a correct
balance, the CO2 quantity immobilised into soil from olive trees and herbaceous biomass (winter and spring
weeds, grass cover etc) should be indicated. Frequently, this information is not indicated, or only partially,
due to the lack of experimental data able to evaluate it in an appropriate way, even if some studies (Sofo et
al., 2005) determined for Mediterranean areas the year-1 of CO2 fixed in an olive grove.
References (selected)
Alberti F., Neri P., Cecchini F. 2005. LCA applied to the Olive Oil Chain – standard study (in Italian). Thesis
of Master in Environmental Development and Management of the Agro-Environmental Systems. University
of Bologna, ENEA-PROT-P135-100.
Baitz, M. 2002: Die Bedeutung der funktionsbasierten Charakterisierung von Flächen-Inanspruchnahmen in
industriellen Prozesskettenanalysen. Ein Beitrag zur ganzheitlichen Bilanzierung. Dissertation. Shaker
(Berichte aus der Umwelttechnik), Aachen
Carli G. 2002. The Environmental Impact of the Olive Oil Production: application of the Life Cycle Assessment
(LCA) methodology (in Italian).
International EPD Consortium (IEC). 2009. General Programme Instructions for Environmental Product
Declaration EPD, Version 1.0, of 29/02/2009.
PCR 2010:07; CPC 21537 – PCR for virgin olive oil and its fractions; ver. 1.0, 2010-04-27.
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