How Green is That Product?

An Introduction to Life Cycle

Environmental Assessment
Homework #5
Goals: In this assignment, youll do the following:

construct an aggregated unit process inventory for water treatment and

delivery using an analysis-based approach; and
solve a multi-functionality issue by dividing a co-product inventory into subprocesses.

Instructions: The questions below can be answered offline. When you complete
the assignment, return to the Week 5 course page on the Coursera website. Click
on the Submit Homework Assignment Answers button, which will allow you to
enter your answers into a web form for automated grading.
Grading: This assignment is worth 100 points. The point values of each answer
are listed below. You can submit a maximum of 30 attempts. The highest scoring
attempt that is submitted before the deadline will count toward your official grade.
Scores for each attempt will be available immediately after submission of your
answers.
Numbers: In this assignment, and throughout this course, numbers will be
expressed using the U.S. numeric convention where commas separate thousands
and the dot (or decimal point) is the decimal separator. For example, the number
one thousand two hundred and one-tenth is written 1,200.1.

Analysis-based estimation of a unit process inventory (8 points for each

correct answer)
For your bottled soft drink LCA, lets assume that a credible life-cycle inventory
cannot be found in the public domain for treatment and delivery of water to the soft
drink bottling plant. Lets further assume that the processes of water treatment
and delivery require only electricity consumption. As a result, youll need to
estimate the electricity requirements of the water treatment and delivery unit
process in your model using an analysis-based approach. Youll use average data
from U.S. water treatment processes from the following article, as well as other
assumptions:
Gleick, P.H., and H.S. Cooley (2009). Energy implications of bottled water.
Environmental Research Letters, Volume 4, Issue 1.
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/4/1/014009 or
http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/4/1/014009 or
http://pacinst.org/publication/energy-implications-of-bottled-water/

First, lets estimate the energy intensity of treating water at a typical water
treatment plant. To do so, enter the electricity intensities of each water treatment
processing step listed in the table below. You can find electricity intensities for each
treatment process in the Gleick and Cooley (2009) article. Then calculate the total
electricity intensity for all of these process steps combined and enter your answer in
the grey answer box. Your answer to Question 1 represents the energy intensity of
treated water leaving the treatment plant. Use the following number format:
XXX (i.e., three digits with no decimals)
Water
treatment
step

Water treatment process

Electricity
intensity (kWh per
million liters
treated)

1
Ozone disinfection
2
UV radiation for bacteria
3
Microfiltration (use the lower value in the range)
4
Reverse osmosis (source TDS = 1000 ppm)
Question 1: What is the total electricity intensity of water
treatment using the above four processing steps (sum of all steps,
kWh per million liters treated)?

Second, lets account for leaks in the treated water distribution system. Assume
that for every liter of treated water that reaches the customer, 1.1 liters of treated
water must leave the treatment plant.1 Accounting for this rate of leakage, and
using your answer to Question 1, enter the total electrical intensity of water
treatment per million liters of treated water DELIVERED TO THE CUSTOMER below.
Use the following number format: XXXX (i.e., four digits with no decimals
and no comma to separate thousands)
Question 2: What is the total electricity intensity of water
treatment per unit of treated water delivered to the customer (kWh
per million liters delivered)?

Third, lets account for the energy required to deliver (i.e., pump) the treated water
from the treatment plant to the customer (i.e., to the point of use). In the United
States, for every million liters of treated water that is ultimately delivered to the
customer, typically 600 kWh of electricity is required for pumping. Based on this
knowledge, and your answer to Question 2, enter the total combined electricity
intensity for treatment and delivery of water to the point of use in units of kWh per
million liters delivered to the customer. Use the following number format:
1 Unfortunately, this rate of leakage is quite typical of U.S. water distribution systems, but it
can be reduced through technology and operations improvements. See for example the
following article: http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/article/Leaks-the-under-appreciated-waterconservation-5647739.php

XXXX (i.e., four digits with no decimals and no comma to separate

thousands)
Question 3: What is the total electricity intensity of water
treatment and delivery per unit of treated water delivered to the
point of use (kWh per million liters delivered)?

Fourth, note that in the unit process inventory for soft drink bottling, which is on the
Bottling tab of the bottled soft drink LCA spreadsheet, the product input
requirements for treated and delivered water are expressed in cubic meters. Thus,
youll need to make sure your analysis-based inventory for water treatment and
delivery is expressed in units of cubic meters of water treated and delivered.
Therefore, convert your answer to Question 3 into units of kWh per cubic meter, and
enter this value in the grey answer box below. Enter only the numerical value
using two decimal places after the decimal separator (i.e., X.XX).
Question 4: What is the total electricity intensity of water
treatment and delivery expressed in units of kWh per cubic meter
delivered to the point of use?

Fifth, use one of the links below to download a spreadsheet file with unit process
inventory tabs for U.S. electricity generation and transmission, water treatment and
delivery, and an aggregated inventory for water treatment and delivery that
includes electricity generation and transmission.

HW5 unit process inventory file (.ods file format)

HW5 unit process inventory file (.xls file format)

The first tab contains a unit process inventory for U.S. electricity generation and
transmission. This is an aggregated unit process inventory that contains all
elementary flow data associated with U.S. average electricity generation and
transmission, including extraction, processing, conversion, transport, and
combustion of all fuels in the system for generating and transmitting electricity to
the points of use in the United States.
The second tab contains a blank unit process inventory for water treatment and
delivery. Assume the following flows for this unit process inventory, and enter the
values into the appropriate rows in the inventory:

Input from nature: 1.1 cubic meters of water

Input from the technosphere: X kWh of electricity, U.S. average mix, at point
of use (replace X with the kWh required to treat and deliver 1 cubic meter
of water to the point of use from your answer to Question 4)
Output to the technosphere: 1 cubic meter of treated water at point of use

The third tab contains another blank unit process inventory table, which youll use
to generate an aggregated unit process inventory for water treatment and delivery.
To generate this aggregated inventory, youll need to do the following 2:
1. Scale the unit process inventory flows for U.S. electricity generation and
transmission based on the quantity of kWh needed for treatment and delivery
of 1 cubic meter of water to the point of use (using your answer to Question
4)
2. Add the scaled flows from the electricity unit process to the direct flows in the
water treatment and delivery unit process
3. Enter the sums of flows into the aggregated inventory for water treatment
and delivery, which will now include all flows related to generation and
transmission of electricity required for water treatment and delivery.
From your completed aggregated inventory for the treatment and delivery of 1
cubic meter of water, enter the mass quantity of carbon dioxide (fossil) emissions to
nature (from cell F36) in the grey answer box below. Use units of kilograms. (Note:
this is a spot check to make sure youve done the calculations correctly). Enter
only the numerical value using two decimal places after the decimal
separator (i.e., X.XX).
Question 5: What is the quantity of the aggregated inventory flow
of carbon dioxide (fossil) to nature for the treatment and delivery of
1 cubic meter of water (in units of kg CO2 per cubic meter of
treated and delivered water)

Multi-functionality and co-products (20 points for each correct answer)

Table A contains representative facility energy use and product output data for the
commercial bakery example that weve discussed in the lectures.
Table A: Energy and production data for a
commercial baking facility
Production of baked bread (kg/year)
500,000
Production of frozen dough (kg/year)
400,000
Natural gas used to generate steam
0.97
(TJ/yr)
Natural gas used directly in baking ovens 2.31
(TJ/yr)
Electricity use (MWh/yr)
461

2 Note that the scaling and addition you need to perform here is exactly the same
at the scaling and addition you performed to generate an aggregated unit process
inventory for PP enclosure injection molding in HW4.

Table B contains data specific to baked bread and frozen dough product outputs at
this commercial bakery, which one might obtain through measurements taken at
each process.
Table B: Energy intensities by process for
Product
Process
Steam
use
(MJ/kg)
Baked bread
Mix
Ferment
0.84
Shape
Proof
0.46
Bake
0.39
Cool
Slice
Package
Frozen dough
Mix
Form and chill
0.32
Bake
Cool
Finish
Package
-

each product
Direct
natural gas
use (MJ/kg)
3.58
1.30
-

line 3
Electricity
use
(kWh/kg)
0.02
0.06
0.05
0.08
0.04
0.08
0.07
0.01
0.52
0.07
0.07

Your job is to determine the total natural gas and electricity inputs attributable to
baked bread in this commercial baking facility. Youll do this by using the
information in Tables A and B to assign the facilitys inputs of natural gas (for
steam), natural gas (for direct use), and electricity to the baked bread and frozen
dough production lines. In other words, youll divide the facility into its subprocesses to avoid arbitrary allocation of facility energy inputs between its two coproducts. Enter your results in the table below. For all answers, enter only the
numerical value using two decimal places after the decimal separator (i.e.,
X.XX).
Question 6: How much of the facilitys annual natural gas use for
steam is attributable to just the baked bread? Use units of
TJ/year in your answer.
Question 7: How much of the facilitys annual direct natural gas
use is attributable to just the baked bread? Use units of TJ/year
in your answer.
Question 8: How much of the facilitys annual electricity use is
attributable to just the baked bread? Use units of MWh/year in
your answer.
3 Recall that a process energy intensity quantifies the amount of input energy
required by a process to generate one unit of mass output