Site-specific life cycle assessment : an introduction and a case study on the Skoghall Mill

The most environmental threats within the pulp and paper industry are of local or regional in character rather than global. The pulp and paper industry requests methods for assessment of the impact of specific mills on their local recipients. With recipient specific knowledge, taking in account the specific prerequisites of the recipient, it is possible to set recipient specific threshold values enabling to reach sustainable emission levels. Earlier experiences show that the present Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) fails to reach this purpose because it assesses potential impacts on a homogenous environment without distinction of the recipient sensitivity. Additionally, the present LCA does not differ between local, regional or global environmental threats. This Master’s Thesis composes a second part of an introduction for carrying out threshold values for aquatic recipients. The first report was made during a previous practice period and consists of a life cycle inventory study of the production at the Norrsundet Mill and the Skoghall Mill. The study aims to suggest a method for assessing local impacts with life cycle perspective, partly by inventory and classification of recipient impact of the two forest industrial mills, and party by an analysis of important literature and development directions in the area. The target audience of this study is an international forest product company, Stora Enso, and also governmental and non-governmental organizations who utilize data and information for environmental applications, or develop methods and methodologies for environmental assessment. This study includes an inventory analysis and an assessment of the environmental conditions of the aquatic recipient of Skoghall Mill during the period 1980-2000 according to the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency’s quality criteria for classification. A general framework for site- specific LCA is presented including a method for inventory and assessment of local environmental impact of the waste water from Skoghall Mill on its aquatic recipient. It is presently not possible to reach such reliability of LCA that is required for an assessment of local environmental impacts. To be able to apply site-specific LCA in the future is required implemented methods for handling environmental data and information internally or externally within the company, or between universities, governmental or non-governmental organizations: standardized methods for inventory of site-specific data from other systems than the technical system: more site-specific data and a higher environmental competence: and also an increased cooperation between suppliers, producers, customers, universities, governmental and non- governmental organizations, etc, to make it possible to aggregate different life cycle stages and to be able to coordinate the costs that become enclosed.Validerat; 20101217 (root