Climate regulation, energy provisioning and water purification: Quantifying ecosystem service delivery of bioenergy willow grown on riparian buffer zones using life cycle assessment

Abstract

Whilst life cycle assessment (LCA) boundaries are expanded to account for negative indirect consequences of bioenergy such as indirect land use change (ILUC), ecosystem services such as water purification sometimes delivered by perennial bioenergy crops are typically neglected in LCA studies. Consequential LCA was applied to evaluate the significance of nutrient interception and retention on the environmental balance of unfertilised energy willow planted on 50-m riparian buffer strips and drainage filtration zones in the SkAyenne region of Sweden. Excluding possible ILUC effects and considering oil heat substitution, strategically planted filter willow can achieve net global warming potential (GWP) and eutrophication potential (EP) savings of up to 11.9 Mg CO(2)e and 47 kg PO(4)e ha(-1) year(-1), respectively, compared with a GWP saving of 14.8 Mg CO(2)e ha(-1) year(-1) and an EP increase of 7 kg PO(4)e ha(-1) year(-1) for fertilised willow. Planting willow on appropriate buffer and filter zones throughout SkAyenne could avoid 626 Mg year(-1) PO(4)e nutrient loading to waters.

Keywords

LCA; Eutrophication; Greenhouse gas emissions; Bioenergy; Agriculture; Environment

Published in

AMBIO: A Journal of the Human Environment
2016, volume: 45, number: 8, pages: 872-884
Publisher: SPRINGER

SLU Authors

• Rosenqvist, Håkan

  • Department of Crop Production Ecology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

Global goals (SDG)

SDG6 Clean water and sanitation
SDG13 Climate action
SDG15 Life on land

UKÄ Subject classification

Environmental Sciences

Publication identifier

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-016-0790-9

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/83084