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Carbon Footprint Associated with Firewood Consumption in Northeast Brazil: An Analysis by the IPCC 2013 GWP 100y Criterion

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Abstract

Firewood is commonly used in developing regions, mainly as a primary energy source. This study quantified and analyzed the carbon footprint associated with firewood consumption in the Brazilian Northeast. The Life Cycle Assessment methodology was applied, using the IPCC GWP 100y environmental impact assessment method and EcoInvent database, within software SimaPro. Forest product harvesting (extractivism) and silviculture were compared from available data (1994 and 2013). The results revealed that the burning of firewood from extractivism presented a higher carbon footprint than silviculture: 16 versus 10 kg CO2-eq/m3, respectively. The Rio Grande do Norte state presented the highest carbon footprint per area associated with extractivism and silviculture, for the year 1994. Considering the most recent available 2013 data, the highest carbon footprints per area associated with extractivism and silviculture were, respectively, for the Ceará and Bahia states. Quantification of carbon footprints are crucial to monitor progress in climate change mitigation, and can be utilized to build inventories, which are important for policy formulation and implementation.

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Notes

  1. Small-scale wood combustion in a 6-kW heater.

  2. Efficiency cannot be ignored [68]. When forest products are used inefficiently to displace fossil fuels, greater carbon-related benefits are achieved through reforestation and protection of standing forests.

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Funding

This study was supported by Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (Grant Nos. 475879/2013-9, 454830/2014-9, 303199/2015-6).

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  1. Center of Alternative and Renewable Energy, Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB), Campus I, Cidade Universitária, João Pessoa, Paraíba, CEP 58.051-900, Brazil

    Luiz Moreira Coelho Junior, Kalyne de Lourdes da Costa Martins & Monica Carvalho

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Coelho Junior, L.M., de Lourdes da Costa Martins, K. & Carvalho, M. Carbon Footprint Associated with Firewood Consumption in Northeast Brazil: An Analysis by the IPCC 2013 GWP 100y Criterion. Waste Biomass Valor 10, 2985–2993 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12649-018-0282-1

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