FCRN Research Library: Life cycle analysis

Food Climate Research Network - title graphic

Food and its life cycle:
impacts, analysis and options

In the list below, icons of PDFs and Word documents, report covers and logos will, where available, link to the relevant report/information. Links within the text will also link to relevant webpages as well as to PDFs etc.

NB: For more information see also the section on Agriculture and food production for LCA studies focusing on the agricultural stages.

WebsitesBack to top

	A useful source of information is the Swedish Food 21 programme. Food 21 is an interdisciplinary research program funded by the Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research (MISTRA), the largest funding body for environmental research in Sweden. The programme carries out research on a very wide range of food and environment related topics, some of them directly concerned with climate change issues. See the website; in particular the abstracts from the 2004 Food 21 Symposium are well worth examining.
	The Danish LCA Food Database has LCA data for products and processes. In addition, it publishes the proceedings from its annual LCA conferences. The papers from the conference include LCAs of a very large range of foods, including bread, apples, milk, olive oil and tomatoes. In addition, there are papers looking at the issue of byproducts in the food sector, as well as those focusing more closely on methodological issues.
	For a methodological approach to life cycle analysis and thinking see the website of 2.-0 LCA Consultants at www.lca-net.com.
	The work of Annika Carlsson-Kanyama is of great interest. This researcher has undertaken a number of fascinating studies into the GHG impacts of the food chain. More information can be found on her web page.

General reports Back to top

Added: 27.11.07	CARBON FOOTPRINT – what it is and how to measure it The European Platform on LCA published this special issue on carbon footprinting on October 2007.
	The environmental impacts of food production and consumption This report, published by Defra, looks at around 150 of the UK's highest selling food products representing the main food categories (carbohydrates, meat and dairy products, fruit and veg etc). Taking a life cycle perspective, it looks at what evidence exists as regards their environmental impacts across a range of issues, including climate change, pesticides and water use. An FCRN summary is available here.
	Determining the environmental burdens and resource use in the production of agricultural and horticultural commodities This Defra-funded report (Defra Projects IS0205) is an LCA of the production of the major agricultural/livestock commodities in the UK. The 10 key commodities studied were bread wheat, potatoes, oilseed rape, tomatoes, beef, pig meat, sheep meat, poultry meat, milk and eggs. An FCRN summary is available here.
	Environmental impact of products (EIPRO): Analysis of the life cycle environmental impacts related to the total final consumption of the EU25 For an overview of the environmental impact of the food sector across the EU 25, see the above report, published in May 2006 by the European Science and Technology Observatory and Institute for Prospective Technological studies. For a brief FCRN summary of its contents as it relates to food, see here.
	The work of Annika Carlsson-Kanyama is usually of great interest. This researcher has undertaken a number of fascinating studies into the GHG impacts of the food chain. FCRN summaries of some of these studies are available here.
	Much of Carlsson-Kanyama's work, as well as that of other researchers (see a selection of the papers below) argue that as consumers we need to alter our patterns of consumption. Common recommendations include eating 'lower on the food chain' in other words, consuming fewer meat and dairy products, and increasing consumption of more pulses and root crops. However, one Swedish paper questions the validity of this view. See: Wallen a, Brandt N, Wennersten R, *Does the Swedish consumer's choice of food influence greenhouse gas emissions*, Environmental Science and Policy 7 (2004) 525-535. The authors calculate the diffferences in emissions between a typical Swedish diet and one that may be thought of as more sustainable – lower in meat and dairy products, higher in pulses and root crops. The report concludes that the emission of GHGs would decrease by only 5% and argues that changes in food production processes can lead to greater reductions in energy use and GHG emissions than changes in diets. A critique of some of the assumptions in this study can be found in the FCRN fruit and vegetable paper pp114-119.
	Counting consumption – CO2 emissions, material flows and Ecological Footprint of the UK by region and devolved country This ambitious report measures the total impact of UK consumption. For more details, see this entry under Consumption.
	The carbon emissions generated in all that we consume In this report The Carbon Trust sets out how the UK's CO2 emissions are broken down into different categories of consumption. For more details, see this entry under Consumption.
	One German paper (Elmar H. Schlich and Ulla Fleissner, The Ecology of Scale: Assessment of Regional Energy Turnover and Comparison with Global Food, Int J LCA 2004 examines the embodied energy of two products - juice and lamb - in relation to the food miles issue. It compares fruit juices from Brazil with those of European and more local German origin. It also compares lamb from New Zealand with lamb from local German farmers. Lamb meat was investigated because it is shipped around the world as a frozen natural food and not concentrated, like juice. The business size of the food producers was also compared. The report refutes the claim that that regional food production and distribution processes are less energy intensive than global systems. It argues that small farmers need more energy to produce and distribute their products than bigger units. It concludes by arguing that ecological quality is mainly influenced by operational efficiency and not by the marketing distance itself.
	A Dutch study Klaas Jan Kramer, Henri C Moll, Sanderine Nonhebel, Harry C Wilting, Greenhouse gas emissions related to Dutch food consumption, Energy Policy 27 (1999) 203-216, Elsevier Publications looks at GHG emissions from the Dutch food system and assesses the relationship between the GHG intensity of products and the household spending on them. It also examines the relative contribution that the different kinds of GHG emissions make to Dutch food chain emissions. An FCRN Summary is available here.
	For a US perspective see: Life cycle-based sustainability indicators for assessment of the US food system, Martin C. Heller and Gregory A. Keoleian, The Center for Sustainable Systems, Report no. CSS00-04, Michigan, December 6, 2000. AN FCRN summary is available here.
	As regards UK based research, one example of a systems approach to the food chain is Give Peas a Chance: Transformations in Food Consumption and Production Systems (PDF, 507kb) by Ken Green and Chris Foster. This paper looks at the environmental and social sustainability of different strategies for food systems by analysing the whole chain of production, processing, distribution and consumption activities of the production of frozen peas, a vegetable that is 'symbolic' of modern food systems and the UK diet. It explores such issues as: Which technologies are seen as critical for determining sustainability in the pea production chains, and which actors are promoting technological change? What are the implications for technological innovation of different pea production and consumption strategies? To what extent do the different strategies ensure variety from which future technological innovations will emerge?
	A Masters dissertation Reductions in the energy intensity of the UK food chain: where should they be made, and would consumers support them? Rebecca White, 3 September 2004, Environmental Change and Management, University of Oxford, points out that more than 50% of a supermarket's lorries are now temperature controlled for movement of chilled or frozen goods. It also highlights the fact that around 16% of the food we buy is thrown away. The vast majority (constituting 11%) is made up of food that is spoiled or ends up being thrown away uneaten. Only the small remainder is vegetable peelings and so forth.

Retail sectorBack to top

On 3-4 May 2007, Tesco and the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford organised a two day seminar on the whats, hows and whys of carbon labelling. See the PDF for the notes that came out of the event.

Subsequently, Tesco and the UK Energy Research Centre held a 'symposium' on carbon labelling. This presented the thinking on carbon labelling which had been developed at the above event.

The following documents are now available:

A presentation by Brenda Boardman given at the 18th May symposium, summarising the thinking developed at the expert round table event.
The expert round table report itself
A pre-event (ie. pre 3/4 May) briefing document outlining some of the questions for consideration

Work carried out by the Resources Research Unit at Sheffield Hallam University, under Professor Nigel Mortimer (who has also carried out work on biofuels – click on the PDF icon for example) ranks various kinds of commercial buildings on the basis of their energy use and CO2 emissions per square metre. The study looks at both food and non-food related premises.

An FCRN summary of the work is available here.

Nigel Mortimer and his team now form the Sheffield office of North Energy Associates.

WaterBack to top

Jungbluth N. (2006). Comparison of the Environmental Impact of Tap Water vs. Bottled Mineral Water, commissioned by the Swiss Gas and Water Association

This study traces the entire life cycle of water from water catchment/extraction to serving it up in a glass. Using a life cycle assessment approach, different variants are compared with one another, for example: carbonated versus non-carbonated and refrigerated versus unrefrigerated.

A direct comparison of drinking water from the tap with unrefrigerated bottled water shows that the environmental impact of tap water is less than one percent of that of bottled water. Even when refrigerated and carbonated, the environmental impact of tap water is approximately only one fourth of that of bottled water. Environmental impact is measured with respect to the following:

Energy use
Crude oil equivalent
Greenhouse gas emissions
Environmental impact points 97
Eco-indicator 99 H/A

The last two take account of impacts such as contaminants, resources and waste and weight them in accordance with pre-defined policy or other objectives.

MilkBack to top

Added: 16.01.08

Milk and its impacts report

The environmental, social and economic impacts associated with liquid milk consumption in the UK and its production, A review of literature and evidence was published in December 2007 by Defra. The report was produced for Defra by The University of Manchester, EuGeos, Delta-innovation and Cranfield University.

Alcoholic beveragesBack to top

	There are few life cycle assessments of alcoholic drinks. However one example is: Siret Talve, Life Cycle Assessment of a Basic Lager Beer, Int J LCA 6 (5) 293 - 298 (2001).
	See also The Alcohol we drink and its contribution to the UK's Greenhouse Gas emissions: A discussion paper, Working paper produced as part of the work of the Food Climate Research Network.

Meat production and consumptionBack to top

	Livestock’s Long Shadow – Environmental Issues and Options, FAO, December 2006 examines in detail the environmental impacts of the global livestock sector. It puts the livestock sector’s contribution to total global greenhouse gas emissions at 18% and argues that the livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to a range of the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global. The paper argues that these problems should be addressed with great urgency and examines a range of technological and policy-oriented mitigation options. For the press release see here.
	A Belgian study looks at emissions arising from meat production and consumption in Belgium. See Greenhouse gas emissions reduction and material flows (PDF, 306kb). Final report, IDD - Institut Wallon - VITO, Federal Office for Scientific, Technical and Cultural Affairs, Belgium, 2001. The study starts by examining trends in consumption of pork, beef and poultry. It then quantifies emissions from these foods, including in its calculations the emissions (CO2 , CH4 and N2O) generated during the production of fertilisers, feed, animal production, slaughtering, processing, packaging, distribution, use and waste treatment. The study concludes that meat consumption accounts for around 4% of Belgium's total GHG emissions. Beef accounts for more than half of these and poultry only 8%.
	Another meat focused study Subak, Susan, 1999. Global environmental costs of beef production, Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 79-91, 7 compares US intensive meat cattle production with a traditional African pastoral system. The study includes assessment both of major land-use and energy-related emissions. The study concludes that although CO2 emissions are greater with the US feedlot system, the methane intensity of the pastoral mode is much larger than the US one because of the lower productivity of system. Subak finds that when indirect sources, which include emissions from fossil fuels and foregone carbon storage on appropriated land, are considered as well as emissions from enteric fermentation and wastes, the social costs of the feedlot system at 15 kg CO2 equivalent/kg beef are more than double that of the pastoralist system.
	Another example of meat-focused research is White T (2000) *Diet and distribution of environmental impact*, Ecological Economics, vol 34 pp 145-153. This points out that 40% of world grain production is currently fed to livestock. At a global level, animal products make up only about 16% of total calories but generate approximately 35% of total environmental impact from agriculture. The study defines environmental impact in terms of land use.
	Other more detailed academic papers of interest include the following: Lovett D.K., Shalloo L., Dillon P., O’Mara F.P. (2006) A systems approach to quantify greenhouse gas fluxes from pastoral dairy production as affected by management regime, Agricultural Systems, 88 Helena Elmquist, *Environmental Systems Analysis of Arable, Meat and Milk Production, Doctoral Thesis, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala, 2005, ISSN 1652-6880, ISBN 91-576-7011-0 Organic vs conventional: I.J.M de Boer. Environmental impact assessment of conventional and organic milk production, Livestock Production Science* 80 (2003) 69-77
	Gold, M. (2004) *The global benefits of eating less meat,* Compassion in World Farming Trust, Petersfield, Hampshire.
	The Defra-funded Market Transformation Programme has undertaken a study of the UK chicken supply chain. The UK Chicken Supply Chain and Energy Consumption policy brief covers the energy used in chicken meat supply from agricultural supply to consumption in both households and through the catering sector. See www.mtprog.com.

FishBack to top

See the Agriculture section of this website for comprehensive coverage of Fisheries.

The Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution's twenty fifth report: Turning the Tide - Addressing the impact of Fisheries on the Marine Environment focuses on both capture fisheries and aquaculture.

For capture fisheries the report notes: "The decreasing fuel efficiency of many fisheries and the large contribution that fuel makes to overall running costs, has led to suggestions that this may be the Achilles' heel of the industry. The rising costs of fuel are likely to impact heavily on certain fishing methods that have low fuel:fish efficiency ratios, such as trawling, in fisheries with diminished target populations, to the point that these fisheries will no longer be economic: Marine emissions from fuels used for international journeys (which are known as bunker fuels) remain outside international agreements to control greenhouse gases. A significant proportion of UK marine greenhouse gas emissions (17%) are related to fishing,but the sector contributes a relatively small amount to overall national emissions (0.01%)."

It also considers the life cycle impacts of aquaculture, noting here that by comparison with meat production, fish farming is a relatively efficient means of providing protein for the human diet. It also observes that it is difficult to make comparisons between the life cycles of farmed and capture fish with the efficiency conversion between capture fisheries and farmed fish depend on the different weightings given to the various areas of sustainability, and the fish species used in comparison.

Life cycle modelsBack to top

More generally the work of the Center for Sustainable Systems may be of interest - its focus is on developing life cycle based models and sustainability metrics for systems that meet societal needs and it has undertaken work in a range of other sectors including transport and renewable energy.

As regards UK based research, one example of a systems approach to the food chain is Give Peas a Chance: Transformations in Food Consumption and Production Systems (PDF, 507kb) by Ken Green and Chris Foster. This paper looks at the environmental and social sustainability of different strategies for food systems by analysing the whole chain of production, processing, distribution and consumption activities of the production of frozen peas, a vegetable that is 'symbolic' of modern food systems and the UK diet. It explores such issues as: Which technologies are seen as critical for determining sustainability in the pea production chains, and which actors are promoting technological change? What are the implications for technological innovation of different pea production and consumption strategies? To what extent do the different strategies ensure variety from which future technological innovations will emerge?

Other studiesBack to top

Added: 08.08.08	Coffee, spinach, butter Flexible Packaging Europe ‘ The the European forum for the flexible packaging industry’ has published a life cycle analysis of 3 packaged food products – coffee, spinach, butter. For coffee, clearly the thing to drink is black sugarless expressos. Instant coffee is marginally better than real, and the water boiling makes up a signfiicant proportion of the overall global warming impact. White coffee has a higher footprint than black, because of the milk. For spinach, fresh works out better than frozen, especially if you don’t waste it. For fresh, agricultural production followed by distribution and retailing are the major hotspots. For frozen, the freezer stage plays a major part, especially if you have an inefficient freezer. For butter, the impacts are overwhelmingly at the agricultural stage, as is the case with all dairy products. In all cases, the impact of the packaging itself is minor. You can download the report here.
Added: 07.02.08	Sustainable Supply Chain report The East Anglian property consultancy Bidwells has published a report, looking at the sustainability of one of Asda’s potato supply chains, from field to store. The project consisted of three interrelated phases. The first phase assessed a number of baseline indicators of sustainability, focusing on the generation of waste, the use of resources including packaging, the use of energy and the associated greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with the supply chain. The second phase was largely based around the findings of phase one, and looked at ways in which the supply chain’s use of resources, primarily energy and packaging, could be replaced by renewable alternatives. Further to this, economic appraisals of the renewable energy technologies were carried out and their potential to reduce GHG emissions from the supply chain was assessed. Phase three ran in parallel to the rest of the project and consisted of in-depth consumer research designed to assess current levels of understanding and interest in sustainability, renewable energy and broader environmental issues. The core objective was to test the scope to develop sustainability as a consumer proposition. The report calculates that this particular supply chain, which delivers over 100,000 tonnes of potatoes is responsible for 21,575 tonnes of CO2e, over 60% of which occur at the farming stage. You can download the report here.
Added: 13.8.07	Lincoln University in New Zealand has produced an updated version of the report it published a year ago in July 2006 (see entry below). This compared energy use in the production and transport of a range of agricultural commodities (including lamb, apples and milk) both in the UK and in New Zealand and concluded that for UK consumers, even taking transport into account, it was more energy efficient to consume NZ products. This latest report looks just at milk and has been updated to include the full range of GHGs (mainly methane and nitrous oxide, in addition to the CO2). The report finds that the UK production system leads to 34 per cent more emissions per kilogram of milk solids and 30 per cent more per hectare than NZ for dairy production even including the shipping to the UK. On a per kg milk basis it finds energy use to be higher (ie. CO2), methane to be higher and overall nitrous oxide emissions to be higher. The NZ system is less intensive than the UK one, with a lower proportion of concentrates fed and lower yields per hectare.
	A study by the Agribusiness and Economic Research Unit at Lincoln University in NZ uses a life cycle approach to calculate energy use and CO2 emissions associated with production and transport to UK of four NZ products: dairy, apples, onions and lamb. With the exception of onion, the results are positive in the sense that even if transport impacts are considered, NZ products still use less energy and have less corresponding emissions (in case of lamb on a ration of 4 to 1). comparing New Zealand production of four products: apples, dairy (discussed in terms of milk solids), onions and sheep meat. An FCRN summary is available here.
	The Swedish project FLIPP adopts a life cycle approach to products. The FLIPP program aims at developing knowledge and understanding of the dynamics, mechanisms and interactions in complex product chains necessary to underpin life cycle based decision support systems. The research has two main focus areas: 1) the relations between different actors within the product chain (the industry perspective), and 2) the possibilities of governments to control the environmental impacts in the product chain (the policy perspective).
	Dutch-sponsored researcher Andrea Ramírez's research suggest that over the past thirty years, the European food industry has failed to make significant improvements in energy efficiency. Her conclusion is based on an analysis of energy consumption, energy efficiency and developments in the food supply chain in 13 European countries. An FCRN summary of her work is available here.
	For an industry approach to life cycle assessment see for example the Unilever website. This tracks Unilever's progress in reducing its CO2 emissions. Specific case studies can be found here.