TP11B Modelling of Resource Depletion and Land Use
C123
1:20 PM - 4:40 PM, Tuesday
() Uncertainty Analysis of Damage Factors on Biodiversity by Mining of Abiotic Resources in LIME.
Ii, R1, Abe, K1, Itsubo, N2, Inaba, A2, 1 Environmental Division, Pacific Consultants Co., Ltd., Tokyo, JAPAN2 Life Cycle Assessment Research Center, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, Tsukuba, JAPAN
ABSTRACT- Uncertainty analysis of damage factors caused by resource mining, which is an integral part of LIME (Life-cycle Impact assessment Method based on Endpoint modeling), was conducted for abiotic resources including some 20 kind of metals. Biodiversity is the focused safeguard subject in this study, and the damage factors by extinction risk of vascular plants were analyzed. Probability distributions of some 3000 parameters, which can be classified into 10 groups, were estimated by detailed data collection in order to apply the Monte Carlo method including boot strap method. The assessment has three steps, and the focused uncertainty factors in each step are as follows, in the case of imported ores like iron ore: (1) The calculation of damage indicator per unit area of changed land for resource mining in Japan: populations and decreasing rates of endangered species in Japan, parameters in regression models of calculating the expected time to extinction, observed populations in each EIS (Environmental Impact Statement) which is one of the fundamental information in our method and statistic error in estimation of the national average of damage amount per unit area. (2) The conversion of the damage indicator into that caused by ore extraction: correction factors in the application of the calculated domestic damage to abroad land change. (3) The calculation of size of land changed by ore mining: ore grade, hidden flows and thickness of deposits. It is considered that improvement of damage factor by additional data (e.g. EISs) collection as well as geographically detailed life-cycle inventories are effective in order to decrease in total uncertainty of the assessment.
Key words: resource mining, uncertainty analysis, biodiversity, extinction risk