LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT OF GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS REDUCTION BY TECHNOLOGY CHOICE AND PLANT REPLACEMENT IN SEWAGE SLUDGE TREATMENT PROCESS

Abstract

 Bio-oil is a renewable and transportable liquid fuel produced by the fast pyrolysis of biomass resources, and it can be used as a fuel for direct combustion with natural gasses and heavy oils. In this paper, we evaluated the reduction effect in greenhouse gases (GHG) emission when introducing the bio-oil production technology into the sewage sludge incineration process, based on the life cycle assessment (LCA). We also developed the scenarios that showed when and how to replace the traditional incineration technology of sewage sludge with the bio-oil production technology in regional scale, and the GHG reduction effect in 6 scenarios were evaluated by applying LCA. The results of analysis showed that the bio-oil production by pyrolysis technology for the sewage sludge would reduce GHG emission by 54.3%, compared with the usual incineration. We also found that to make the transition to a centralized treatment of sewage sludge would reduce GHG emissions and promote the effective utilization of more sewage sludge.