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Environmental Impact Assessment of Farming with Combined Methods of Life Cycle Assessment and Farm Carbon Calculator

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Abstract

Nowadays, farming is one of the major sources of environmental impacts in the world. This research developed an approach of combining the life cycle assessment (LCA) and Farm Carbon Calculator (FCC) to assess the environmental impact of farming. The LCA is a general method covering a broad spectrum of environmental impact assessment and the FCC is a farming specific method focusing on carbon emission and sequestration. The approach is applied in an organic vegetable farm as an application scenario. In this chapter, the scope of the investigation is presented first, followed by assessing the environmental impact of farming by utilizing the LCA and FCC methods respectively. The assessments were conducted regarding key aspects of farming, including fuel/energy consumption, fertility improvement, materials, distribution, and waste/disposals. According to the assessment results, suggestions for reducing the environmental impact of farming are proposed. The outcome of the investigation proved the correctness and the compensative advantages of the approach.

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Abbreviations

FCC:

Farm Carbon Calculator

GHGs:

Greenhouse Gases

LCA:

Life Cycle Assessment

LCIA:

Life Cycle Impact Assessment

LCI:

Life Cycle Inventory

SO:

Scilly Organics

SOM:

Soil Organic Matter

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the financial supports received from the European Commission’s FP7 Environment programme for myEcoCost project (Grant number 308530) and H2020 Circular Economy program for CIRC4Life project (Grant agreement number 776503). The authors thank Dr Giuseppe Salvia, former research fellow working at the Advanced Design and Manufacturing Engineering Centre of Nottingham Trent University, for his contribution to the research reported in this article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Advanced Design and Manufacturing Engineering Centre, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK

    Daizhong Su & You Wu

  2. Jonathan Smith Consulting, Glasgow, UK

    Jonathan Smith

  3. School of Art and Design, Shanghai University of Engineering Science, No. 333 Longteng Road, Songjiang, 201620, Shanghai, China

    Zhongming Ren

  4. Shanghai Institute of Design and Innovation, Tongji University, No. 281 Fuxin Road, Yangpu, 200092, Shanghai, China

    Zhongming Ren

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  1. Daizhong Su
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  2. Jonathan Smith
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Correspondence to Daizhong Su .

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  1. Advanced Design and Manufacturing Engineering Centre, School of Architecture, Design and the Built Environment, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK

    Daizhong Su

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Su, D., Smith, J., Wu, Y., Ren, Z. (2020). Environmental Impact Assessment of Farming with Combined Methods of Life Cycle Assessment and Farm Carbon Calculator. In: Su, D. (eds) Sustainable Product Development. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-39149-2_12

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-39149-2_12

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-39148-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-39149-2

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