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A number of industry specific methods for chemical substitution have been developed and tested in the project ’Counseling methods for chemical substitution’. The result of this work is described in this report and has in addition been integrated in a prototype for an electronic auxiliary tool. This report and particularly the final version of the electronic auxiliary tool will be a help to both the printing companies and to the industry’s counselors, who work with the often difficult process of chemical substitution.

As part of the ongoing EU FP7 project LC-Impact (www.lc-impact.eu) new life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) methods are going to be developed and tested on industry cases. Among the life cycle assessment (LCA) impact categories in focus are aquatic eutrophication. As related to especially the marine environment very few and restricted attempts have yet been done on trying to include eutrophication in LCA. The aim of LC-Impact is to develop both a global and a spatial (and temporal) differentiated model, as both central fate processes, sensitivities of receiving environments (e.g. differences in limiting nutrient and variations in this over the year) and the resulting damage can show important spatial variations. Both midpoint and endpoint (damage) modelling are included and the aim is to base the damage modelling on dose-response curves expressing the correlation between the (increase in) nutrient concentration and the potentially affected fraction of species in the marine ecosystem. This poster will present a review of the very limited existing attempts on how to include marine eutrophication in LCA and discuss alternative methodologies on how to model the environmental mechanism of this impact category.

The implementation of the EU REACH regulation will most probably promote substitution within sectors handling a lot of different chemicals like the printing industry. With the aim of being at the cutting edge of this development the Danish EPA together with the Danish printing industry and IPU are running a substitution project. A major part of the work has been mapping the presence of chemicals which are potential candidates for substitution (e.g. PBT, CMR, vPvB, EDS) within the Danish printing industry and this work was recently finished. The mapping comprises a combination of a literature study and an investigation of the actual (2007) presence of candidate substances at 15 Danish printing houses including the examination of almost 900 MSDS’s (i.e. products). Furthermore, a focused search in the Danish Product Register has been included. More than 150 of the mapped substances are candidates for substitution according to Danish legislation (List of Undesirable Substances) and about 40 of these substances fulfil one or more of the criteria (e.g. CMR, EDS) for the REACH Annex XIV candidate list (authorisation). Three substances (phthalates) out of the first and recently published Annex XIV candidate list (in total 15 substances) were found in the Danish printing industry.

The environmental sustainability assessments described in this report is based on life cycle assessments (LCA) of selected waste water treatment technology (WWTT) cases included in NEPTUNE. The basic approach in these assessments (avoided against induced impacts) is described in Deliverable 4.1 (Larsen et al. 2007) and other methodological issues (e.g. normalization and weighting) in Deliverable 4.2 (Larsen et al. 2009). The basic approach is illustrated in a simplified way for the case ozonation in Figure 2.1. The technologies investigated include conventional WWT (reference), ozonation, sand filtration, PAC addition, anammox, sludge incineration (reference), other sludge inertization technologies (wet oxidation, high temperature pyrolysis, gasification) and sludge triage (including sludge disintegration technologies, i.e. thermal hydrolysis and ultrasound disintegration). They are divided into four clusters related to the main purpose of the treatment, e.g. nutrient removal or micropollutant removal. All are assessed within the cluster by comparing with the reference or by looking at induced versus avoided environmental impacts potentials originated from the various emissions and flows inventoried. Figure 2.1 Do we induce more environmental impact than we avoid by introducing a new waste water treatment technology (sub-optimisation)? The study is based as much as possible on data obtained directly from NEPTUNE partners for the physical and functional inventory. In particular, the functional inventory of cluster 1 on micropollutant removal, tracks 22 organic micropollutants (pharmaceuticals) that have been sampled in different WWTTs by NEPTUNE partners. The resulting inventory is then modelled according to the EDIP97 methodology on the GaBi LCA modelling software, i.e. GaBi 4 (PE 2008), with EcoInvent 2.0 database integrated (EcoInvent 2007).

The EU FP6 NEPTUNE project is related to the EU Water Framework Directive and the main goal is to develop new and optimize existing waste water treatment technologies (WWTT) and sludge handling methods for municipal waste water. Besides nutrients, a special focus area is micropollutants (e.g. pharmaceuticals, heavy metals and endocrine disrupters). As part of this work a holistic based prioritisation among technologies and optimisations have been done. Tools for this prioritisation include life cycle assessment (LCA) and cost/efficiency. The LCA is performed as a comparative LCA and the concept of induced impacts as compared to avoided impacts is introduced in the life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) part. A relatively high number of micropollutants, especially pharmaceuticals, have been included. Furthermore, as novel approaches, preliminary methodologies for impact categories on pathogens and whole effluent toxicity have been developed. About 15 different waste water and sludge treatment technologies (or combinations) have been assessed. This paper will present the LCA results from running the induced versus avoided impact approach on one of the WWTTs, i.e. ozonation.

The European Water Framework Directive addresses the issue of pollution from urban waste water and is thereby changing the scope of sewage treatment. As part of this process, the Neptune project (EU, FP6) focuses on developing new and upgrading existing technologies of waste water and sludge treatment for municipal waste water. A special focus area in Neptune is sludge handling because the sludge amount is expected to increase due to advanced waste water treatment. The main sludge processing methods assessed in Neptune can be divided into two categories: disintegration processes before anaerobic digestion (thermal hydrolysis and ultrasound disintegration) and inertisation processes performed at high temperatures (incineration, pyrolysis, gasification, wet oxidation) but they all aim at volume reduction and removal of biodegradable compounds before safe sludge disposal or reuse of its resources. As part of a sustainability assessment (or “best practice evaluation”), a comparison between the existing and new sludge handling techniques have been done by use of life cycle assessment (LCA).The concept of induced impacts as compared to avoided impacts when introducing a new sludge treatment technology is used for the environmental comparison. Emissions from the treatment of the sludge as well as energy consumption and production, chemical consumption, infrastructures and transport are taken into account. This poster will present the results of LCA’s performed on different inertisation technologies. Incineration is used as the reference process, as it is the only existing well-developed technology, while other techniques like pyrolysis and gasification are relatively new, and only exist at lab-scale or pilot-plant scale.

The EDIPTEX project has three main deliverables. These are1. Modelling of the lifecycle of six textile products and calculation of the connected environmental impact2. Obtaining almost 500 textile unit processes following the EDIP unit process data format3. Calculation of equivalency factors for a number of chemicalsFor each of the deliverables extensive documentation material exists, which is published in this report.In the EDIPTEX project, a number of lifecycle assessments (environmental assessments) were carried out on textile products. But an extensive and detailed lifecycle assessment case is not particularly information friendly - only to other lifecycle assessment experts and consultants.The Programme for Cleaner Products etc. has therefore supported a dissemination project "Information on EDIPTEX". In this dissemination project the six EDIPTEX environmental assessments were transformed into six leaflets which, on only four pages each and in a professional layout, outline the environmental profile of the six products.The six environmental assessments include:A T-shirt of 100% cotton /1/A jogging suit of nylon microfibres with a cotton lining /2/A work jacket of 65 per cent polyester and 35 per cent cotton /3/A blouse of viscose, nylon and elastane /4/A tablecloth of cotton /5/A floor covering of nylon and polypropylene /6/The present report informs in detail about methods and principles used in the environmental assessments of the six selected EDIPTEX textile products.The major part of the lifecycle is common for many textile products, e.g. energy production, production of raw materials (e.g. cultivation and harvesting cotton), certain production processes (such as dyeing polyester), washing and ironing in the use phase and incineration during disposal. Such basic data have been established during the EDIPTEX project. The EDIPTEX project has been based upon the nationally and internationally recognised environmental assessment method EDIP - "Environmental Design of Industrial Products".The project has obtained environmental data for several hundred processes "from cradle to grave" in the lifecycle of textiles. EDIPTEX environmental data and a PC tool provide the possibility for combining the lifecycle of a textile product from cradle to grave, process by process, on the computer screen through a modelling, and letting the computers calculate the equivalency impacts. EDIPTEX environmental data and the environmental assessments, which can be modelled on the basis of these data, thus represent a unique tool in connection with e.g. preparing and documenting lifecycle assessments and environmental declarations for goods. In connection with the project "Information on EDIPTEX" a leaflet has been prepared "EDIP environmental data for textiles - a survey" /7/, which gives an overview of the environmental data, so that others can use the data during environmental assessment of textiles. All data are now also available in the PC tool GaBi EDIP - the successor of the EDIP PC tool.For a number of commonly occurring emissions (discharges) and for emissions which have been assessed in previous projects within EDIP, equivalency factors had already been established. But for a number emissions, no equivalency factors had been calculated. If these emissions were to be included in the calculations of the contribution of a product on the impact categories regarding toxicity, equivalency factors for the substances would have to be calculated, and they would have to be included in the PC tool. In the EDIPTEX case scenarios, equivalency factors for ecotoxicity and human toxicity for approx. 50 textile specific chemicals are used. Within the EDIPTEX project, equivalency factors for ecotoxicity and human toxicity have been calculated for approx. 35 different substances, which are part of the very often composite chemicals. Further, approx. 20 substances are assessed as unproblematic regarding ecotoxicity and human toxicity in discharges via wastewater treatment plants. Fate factors for the technosphere for the substances have also been calculated, i.e. spraying with pesticides on farmland and discharge to wastewater treatment plant. Fate factors for pesticides have been calculated, i.e. distribution factors regarding where the substances end up after spraying. Similarly non-pesticides fate factors have been calculated for discharge to wastewater treatment plant, i.e. whether the substances end up in sludge, water or air after wastewater treatment. Using fate factors for the technosphere, takes into account that wastewater discharges from Danish textile factories are treated in wastewater treatment plants prior to discharge to the environment. For example, readily biodegradable substances will by and large disappear in the wastewater treatment plant and as such will not directly have an impact on the environment.The EDIP database included equivalency factors on human toxicity for approx. 100 substances and on ecotoxicity for approx. 70 substances. This is an important increase in equivalency factors. All equivalency factors are now also available in the PC tool GaBi EDIP - the successor of the EDIP PC tool.

In order to do a life cycle assessment (LCA) of a waste water treatment technique, a system to handle the mapped inventory data and a life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) method/model is needed. Besides NEPTUNE, another EU-funded project has the same methodology need namely INNOWATECH (contract No. 036882) running in parallel with NEPTUNE but focusing on industrial waste water. With the aim of facilitating cooperation between the two projects a common LCA methodology framework has been worked out and is described in the following. This methodology work has been done as a joint effort between NEPTUNE WP4 and INNOWATECH WP4 represented by the WP4 lead partner IVL. The aim of the co-operation is to establish common methodologies and/or LCA models and/or tools in order to achieve a homogenous approach in INNOWATECH and NEPTUNE. Further, the aim is to facilitate possibilities of data exchange between the two projects and eventually normalise the final output. A coordination/working group with representatives from INNOWATECH (WP4) and NEPTUNE (WP4) has been set up. It consists of the following representatives from the two projects: NEPTUNE: Henrik Fred Larsen (DTU/IPU), Michael Hauschild (DTU), Henrik Wenzel (SDU). INNOWATECH: Mats Almemark (IVL), Christian Junestedt (IVL). In support of this work and as a starting point for especially NEPTUNE WP4, a review of existing LCA studies on waste water treatment technologies has been done by DTU and is included as an Appendix.

Life cycle assessment (LCA) studies on products or services seem generally to be carried out without a proper inclusion of potential toxic impacts from emissions of chemicals. The first goal of the thesis is to investigate this statement and to clarify whether or not the outcome of an LCA can be significantly dependent on the inclusion of toxicity- or chemical-related impact categories. The two main reasons for poor coverage of potential toxic impacts from chemical emissions in LCA studies are lack of available data on upstream emissions (e.g. emissions during production of raw materials) and lack of substance data on known emissions. To be able to characterize the potential toxic impacts on humans and the environment of chemical emissions, substance data on fate and effect are needed. The second goal of this thesis is to investigate how to deal with low substance data availability on especially effect data within the context of LCA, when the aim is to improve the inclusion of toxicity- or chemical-related impact categories. The first goal regarding the significance of potential toxic impacts in LCA is investigated by carrying out a full LCA case study on printed matter and putting special emphasis on the inclusion of chemical emissions. The second goal regarding low data availability is addressed in two ways. First by introducing selection methods, which are chemical screening methods designed to select the most significant chemical emissions on a low to very low data availability. Secondly by developing a low data demand ecotoxicity effect indicator to be used together with a fate indicator, when estimating the potential impact of chemical emissions. The results of the case study document that for LCAs on printed matter, the inclusion of chemical-related impact categories can be decisive for the outcome, and it shows that chemical-related impact categories are poorly or not at all included in previous studies. The share for the total environmental impact of for example the printing process in the case study is reduced from 41% to 10%, if the chemical-related impact categories are excluded. So, the basis for defining for example ecolabelling criteria (typically based on life cycle thinking) on printed matter is substantially different depending on whether or not the chemical-related impact categories are (properly) included. The investigation on selection methods shows that only three chemical screening methods, associated with a characterisation method, and therefore here defined as selection methods, actually exist to day. Selection method performance criteria are developed including demands on consistency in prioritisation with associated characterisation method, applicability to different chemical groups, high data availability combined with low data demand, data useable in characterisation, user friendliness and transparency. A mainly qualitative evaluation of the existing selection methods against these performance criteria shows that none of these score high on all criteria, and this indicates the need for development of new selection methods. Recommendations on which components to include, which issues to address and general principles for developing selections methods are therefore given. A quantitative evaluation of the consistency in chemical ranking between the existing selection methods (EDIP-selection, Priofactor and CPM-selection), the risk ranking method EURAM, and the characterisation methods EDIP97 and CPM, is performed. The result of this evaluation shows a good correlation between the ranking of all the tested methods, but strongest between the EDIP97 method and its two associated selection methods EDIP-selection (revised version) and Priofactor. A statistical test of correlation in ranking between EDIP97, Priofactor, CPM and EURAM shows significant correlation in all cases. The main reason for this result is that a common perception of what makes a substance ecotoxicologically problematic underlies all four methods. Nevertheless, some outliers as compared to the EDIP97 ranking are identified. These outliers are due to specific characteristics of each of the methods which for certain combinations of substance properties may result in false negatives or false positives as compared to EDIP97. These characteristics include the influence of data availability on the size of assessment factors for conversion of acute effect data to chronic values, and whether or not mode of entry is taken into account in the fate modelling. Further, the reversing of the effect of toxicity on ranking by negative logKow values is observed when logKow is a direct factor in the expression, and there is a significant influence of the way in which the BCF is estimated and included. The second part of the second goal of this thesis, which deals with low availability of substance effect data, is addressed by carrying out an inventory of existing ecotoxicity effect indicator approaches, including a qualitative evaluation based on developed performance criteria. Both impact approaches, and damage approaches, which are all at an early development stage, are included. The evaluation of the existing impact approaches, i.e. the assessment factor-based PNEC approach and the PAF-based approach, shows pros and cons for both. However, taking the comparative nature of LCA and its aim for best estimate into account, and combining this with the possibilities for reducing the data demand of an EC50-based PAF approach, and further including the (at least theoretical) connection to damage approaches, leads to the choice of an effect-based average PAF ecotoxicity effect indicator expressed by 0.5/HC50EC50 for further development. The most reasonable way to estimate the hazardous concentration for 50% of the included species (HC50) based on only three acute laboratory effect data is hereafter investigated by testing and discussing different ways of estimating averages (e.g. median and geometric mean), different data selection strategies and different ways of estimating uncertainty (confidence) limits around the HC50EC50 value. The results of this investigation show that the geometric mean is the most robust estimator for small data sets. Seeking the coverage of many chemicals in LCA and considering the fact that the main part of the useable single species laboratory test data (EC50) is on algae, crustacean and fish, which in practice represent the trophic levels primary producers, primary consumers and secondary consumers, the use of a minimum of three acute EC50 values from each of these three throphic levels is recommended when estimating HC50EC50. Due to the comparative nature of LCA, the possible bias from severe unequal species representation and inclusion of erroneous data, due to bad non-standardised test conditions, should be avoided by only including tests on standard organisms fulfilling certain defined test criteria on durations and endpoints. Further, in order to avoid the effect of possible haphazard or regulatory determined species representations in the data set used, which may be decisive for the weighting of each trophic level in the estimation, the geometric mean based on the average of the averages within each trophic level is chosen for the ecotoxicity effect indicator GM-troph. Hereby, it is consciously chosen to put equal weight on each throphic level. The statistical confidence limits around the GM-troph are in most cases too wide, because the average is based on only three data values, making a statistically significant differentiation between the different toxicants nearly impossible. However, test on fictitious three data value test sets based on combinations of max and min values from a larger ‘mother’ data set indicates that the use of the min and max value among the three data value GM-troph data set (i.e. average within algae, average within crustacean and average within fish) as max-min limits around GM-troph gives a reasonable (and as good as confidence limits) certainty that the ‘true’ GM-troph value (based on the full ‘mother’ data set) lies within the interval. The inclusion of the toxicity-related impact categories in LCA at a similar level as the better established impact categories, like global warming, is far from achieved yet. This thesis point at relatively well functioning selection methods and defines the framework including performance criteria and recommendations on how to improve existing selection methods and how to develop new ones. By introducing the GM-troph this thesis contributes with a robust, low data demanding effect part of the ecotoxicity characterisation factor. The GM-troph has the potential of facilitating a high number of characterisation factors which are robust with relatively low uncertainty if combined with a ‘fate part’ of equal strength. The way for further improvement of the involvement of toxicity-related impact categories in LCA is hereby facilitated.