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Green Technologies in Food Production and Processing pp 61–82Cite as

Life cycle assessment of crop production

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Part of the book series: Food Engineering Series ((FSES))

Abstract

The “environmental footprint” of crop production includes a wide range of different impacts such as nitrate leaching, ammonia volatilization, greenhouse gas emissions, or energy consumption, which itself may contribute to different environmental effects such as eutrophication, acidification, and global warming. The life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology is particularly suitable to examine and analyze the “environmental footprint,” because LCA is an inventory and evaluation of all environmental impacts (emissions and resource consumption) along the life cycle of a product from “cradle to grave.” For fertilizer, this means the inclusion of raw material extraction, through production to application. Today, LCA is a standardized methodology that is mainly used to compare different alternatives (products or services) and to determine their environmental hot spots.

A complete LCA study aims at including all potential environmental impacts from crop production systems eutrophication, off-site acidification, global warming, toxicity, and resource consumption (land, water, minerals, fossil fuels). The LCA approach is often applied now to determine the so-called “carbon footprint” of products or production systems. Carbon footprint studies of crop production are particularly critical, because it is not only the energy-related CO2 emissions that are relevant. Other specific issues to be considered include: (1) direct and indirect nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions; (2) potential land-use change impacts (e.g., CO2 from deforestation); (3) varying greenhouse gas emissions from different fertilizers and fertilizer production technologies, and finally (4) the CO2 fixation in crops, which is only accountable if fossil fuels are replaced by bioenergy sources. This chapter gives examples of LCA and carbon footprint calculations of winter wheat produced in Europe.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Yara International, Research Centre Hanninghof, Dülmen, Germany

    Frank Brentrup

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  1. Frank Brentrup
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Correspondence to Frank Brentrup .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Food Research & Development Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Casavant Boulevard W. 3600, St.-Hyacinthe, J2S 8E3, Québec, Canada

    Joyce I. Boye

  2. Food Research & Development Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Casavant Boulevard W. 3600, St.-Hyacinthe, J2S 8E3, Québec, Canada

    Yves Arcand

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Brentrup, F. (2012). Life cycle assessment of crop production. In: Boye, J., Arcand, Y. (eds) Green Technologies in Food Production and Processing. Food Engineering Series. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-1587-9_4

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