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6A - LCIA - Toxicity/RA (WEP/227) Environmental comparison of the wet and thermal routes of phosphate fertilisers production through Life Cycle Assessment: a Brazilian experience. Kulay, Luiz A.1, Herrera, Israel2, Castells, F.2, Silva, G.A.1, 1 University of Sao Paulo, Escola Politécnica, Sao Paulo, Brazil2 University Rovira i Virgili, Tarragona, Spain ABSTRACT- Brazilian fertiliser companies have been making important investments to attend the food demand of the country. Although the efficiency of fertilisers in increasing crops' yields is unquestionable, the processes in use nowadays can be generating significant environmental impacts and damages. Under this approach, the current work presents a comparison of two fertiliser production routes: the wet, in which the fertilisers are obtained by digestion of phosphatic rocks with inorganic acids, and the thermal route, in which phosphatic rocks is fused with serpentite. Triple Super Phosphate (TSP), a fertiliser that generates a great amount of phosphogypsum - an industrial waste due to its low usefulness, has been chosen to represent the wet route. On the other hand, the thermal route was represented by Fused Magnesium Phosphate (FMP), which production consumes a large amount of electricity. This comparison was carried out through a methodology based on Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and includes the following steps: Modelling of the FMP and TSP processes; Life Cycle Inventories by the eco-vectors method; Eco-Matrixes of impacts and Assessment of the environmental damages throughout each system. The environmental impacts of the wet route are more significant in a local level while the thermal route causes greater impacts in a regional level. Key words: Environmental damage assessment, Life Cycle Assessment, Eco-matrix analysis, Fertiliser |
