Aquaculture Europe 2014

October 14-17, 2014

Donostia–San Sebastián, Spain

ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT WITH LCA IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF MORE SUSTAINABLE SALMON AQUACULTURE PRODUCTION

Authors: Erik Skontorp Hognes*, Friederike Ziegler, Veronica Sund, Katarina Nilsson and Trine Ytrestøyl
 
*SINTEF Fisheries and aquaculture, Trondheim. Mail: erik.hognes@sintef.no . tlf: +47 40225577

Introduction
Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a powerful tool to help decision makers in the seafood industry to establish and manage their environmental management systems and to document environmental properties of their products for clients and other stakeholders (Hognes, Nilsson et al. 2014).
LCA has been used to study seafood production systems from fisheries and from aquaculture(Ziegler, Winther et al. 2012) . Different parts of the aquaculture systems have been studied in detail, e.g. feed production (Hognes, Ziegler et al. 2011)
During the last decade, the Norwegian salmon industry have cooperated with researchers to study the environmental properties of salmon production and to establish tools and databases that he industry can use to ensure their environmental sustainability.
 
Method
Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a method to book keep the environmental impacts that a product causes throughout its life cycle: From extraction of raw materials, processing, distribution and use. LCA is holistic as it assess complete production systems, including all inputs of materials and energy that underpin the production system. A complete LCA also include a complementary set of environmental impacts. This way LCA can map why environmental impacts are caused and what kind of environmental impacts that are caused. These holistic properties makes LCA a powerful tool for decision makers to retrieve information on the potential environmental effects of their decisions and LCA provides a solid fundament for any environmental management system. LCA is standardized by ISO in their 14 000 family for environmental management (ISO 2006, ISO 2006).
 
Results
The project portfolio started with studying the carbon footprint (climate impacts) from salmon aquaculture production from fisheries and growing of feed ingredients and up to retailer gate in different markets and exported in different ways (Winther, Ziegler et al. 2009) (figure 1). This showed that feed is a dominating environmental- and climate aspect for salmon products, but for some products transports are also important (Ziegler, Winther et al. 2012).
 
 
During the resent years, the focus has mainly been on feed production and the environmental impacts that have been assessed have expanded from climate impacts and energy use to also include occupation of agricultural land, marine primary production required and now also water use. Based on detailed data from the biggest Norwegian salmon feed producers the current Norwegian feed diets and potential future diets have been studied.  Products from salmon aquaculture was also compared to similar poultry products (figure 2).
 
Conclusions
The assessments have provided decision makers in the salmon seafood industry with comprehensive information on how and why their products cause environmental impacts. The assessments have also built a solid methodology and data basis that is now available for the aquaculture industry to expand and improve their environmental management systems, to reduce their negative environmental impacts, increase efficiency and move towards more environmentally sustainable production.  
 
References
Hognes, E. S., K. Nilsson, F. Ziegler and V. Sund (2014). DRIVERS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT IN THE SEAFOOD INDUSTRY. Aquaculture Europe Aquaculture Europe Magazine, European Aquaculture Society (EAS).
Hognes, E. S., F. Ziegler and V. Sund (2011). Carbon footprint and area use of farmed Norwegian salmon , SINTEF Fisheries and aquaculture.
ISO (2006). ISO 14040 Environmental management - life cycle assessment - principles and framework. ISO 14040:2006(E). International Organization for Standardization. Geneva. Switzerland.
ISO (2006). ISO 14044 Environmental management - Life cycle assessment - Requirements and guidelines. ISO 14044:2006(E). International Organization for Standardization. Geneva. Switzerland.
Winther, U., F. Ziegler, E. Skontorp Hognes, A. Emanuelsson, V. Sund and H. Ellingsen (2009). Project report: Carbon footprint and energy use of Norwegian seafood products  Trondheim, Norway, SINTEF Fisheries and aquaculture.
Ziegler, F., U. Winther, E. S. Hognes, A. Emanuelsson, V. Sund and H. Ellingsen (2012). "The Carbon Footprint of Norwegian Seafood Products on the Global Seafood Market." Journal of Industrial Ecology: no-no.