Life Cycle CO₂ Analysis for Large-scale Exhibition

Abstract

Objective. Interests in the environmental assessment for events are increasing rapidly. Total emission of carbon dioxide have assessed in several large-scale events such as G8 summit in Toya lake, FIFA world cup in Germany and winter Olympic in Torino to perform carbon offset. The authors raised the several problems in the previous studies and carried out LCCO₂ for Tokyo marathon. The result of this study proved that the expansion of the scope of LCA was critically important, because many types of products used in the event such as stands, temporary lavatory, fence, commemorative products influenced the total amount of CO₂ emission.
Materials and Methods. In the case of exhibitions, the collection of fundamental data might be harder than the case of the other types of event, because investigators have to contact a number of related people such as exhibitors, guests, organizer and representatives of event hall. Various types of products like creations, exhibits, equipment, and distribution media have to be covered in environmental assessment. This study evaluated total CO₂ emission for “Eco-products 2010”. Inventory database was prepared in advance. The transition of CO₂ emission was evaluated with the comparison with the calculated results for the past two years.
Results and Discussion. Inventory analysis was carried out using CO₂ intensities (i.e. CO₂-kg/kg, CO₂-kg/kWh, CO₂-kg/1Million Japanese Yen) and activities units (e.g. kg, kWh, JY). CO₂ intensities which involve direct and indirect CO₂ emissions were prepared using input output analysis. All of the activities units were obtained by questionnaire to organizer, guests, and exhibitors. The total amount of CO₂ emission including direct and indirect emissions was calculated as 4,610 ton. The environmental burdens of exhibitors occupied a half of total amounts. Creations, rental goods, staff’s activities and distribution media were key items which influence CO₂ emissions emitted by exhibitors. The contribution of guests used by participants exceeded 40% of total emission. Most of this amounts come from transportation. The emissions from organizer and event site were relatively small. The transitions of CO₂ emissions were depending on the related groups. Classification of total emission to each group would facilitate to understand their environmental performance and support the reduction of CO₂ emissions by themselves.
Conclusions. LCA for large-scale exhibition was carried out using CO₂ intensity given by input output analysis. This approach enabled us to obtain the calculated result quickly. Temporary result was released to the public on the day of the event. Final result was obtained after the fixed data were provided to the practitioners. Through this process, it became possible to share environmental information among various stakeholders like guests and organizer effectively.