LCA (Life Cycle Assessment) of Roses and Cyclamens in Greenhouse Cultivation G. Russo P. Buttol and M. Tarantini Dept. Progesa University of Bari, Via G. Amendola 165/a Italy

ENEA, Via Martiri di Monte Sole, 4, 40129 Bologna Italy

Keywords: environmental analysis, protected cultivation, cut flowers, pot plants Abstract

The flower market of the Terlizzi agro-industrial district (Bari, Italy) represents the 20% of the Italian production, which is the second in Europe after the Netherlands. The main products are cut flowers and plants in vase, in particular roses and cyclamens. In this framework the European Project “Ecoflower Terlizzi” was carried out to support the implementation of a sustainable environmental policy in the Terlizzi district. The project was aimed at defining the criteria of environmental quality of the flowers produced in this area and includes both the definition of an EPD (Environmental Product Declaration) programme and of a local eco-label (type I). To reach this objective environmental analyses and LCA (Life Cycle Assessment) studies were carried out on a sample of seven enterprises representative of the Terlizzi’s production systems. They were analysed on the basis of on-site data collection including materials and components for structures and equipments, energy and water consumption, fertilizers, pesticides and other chemicals used in the cultivation phase. Three farms produce roses with soilless cultivation systems, two produce roses in soil and two produce cyclamens’ pots. In this paper the main issues concerning the application of the LCA methodology to the production of roses and cyclamens and the results obtained will be presented. Thermal energy consumption gives the main contribution to the environmental impacts of the roses’ life cycle. For the cyclamens’ pots the main contribution comes from the seedlings production. For both productions, electricity consumption, structures and equipments give a significant contribution to the environmental impacts. INTRODUCTION

The flower market of the Terlizzi district, characterised by more than 600 small and medium sized enterprises often organized as family business and a greenhouse surface equal to about 110 km2, represents the 20 % of the Italian production, which is the second in Europe after the Netherlands. The work presented in this paper has been carried out in the framework of the LIFE-Environment project “Ecoflower Terlizzi- Demonstration project for the Environmental Product Declaration: the flowers of Terlizzi and the local eco-label”, which was funded by the European Commission (LIFE ENV/IT/000480). The aim of the project was to support the adoption of environmentally friendly practices and to promote the efficient use of resources in greenhouse flowers’ production in the Terlizzi district. The use of greenhouses increases both the productivity and the quality of the floricultural products introducing a forced microclimate, but this is obtained through an intensive use of energy, water, fertilisers and pesticides. Several eco-labels for flowers’ production exist worldwide, but few studies can be found in literature, which include the analysis of the entire life cycle of the floricultural products. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is one of the most widely known and internationally accepted methodologies to compare environmental impacts of processes and systems and to evaluate their sustainability in the entire life cycle. To determine the environmental impact of flowers’ production a LCA study was carried out on rose stems and cyclamens in vase of seven enterprises, selected on a sample of 22 enterprises participating in the project, as representative of the different production systems of the Terlizzi area:

359Proc. IS on Greensys2007 Eds.:S. De Pascale et al. Acta Hort. 801, ISHS 2008

cultivation systems (production of plants in vase, in soil, soilless cultures), greenhouse structures and covering materials (glass or plastic films), microclimatic characteristics of the greenhouses (with or without heating system). In this paper we describe the LCA study of 7 flower products farmed in greenhouses of different enterprises: three farms produce rose stems in hydroponic culture (Farms A, B, C), two produce rose stems in soil (Farms D, E) and two produce cyclamens (Farms F, G). MATERIALS AND METHODS Objective

The LCA study aims to assess the environmental impact of flower products of the Terlizzi district in order to reach the following objectives: identify the flowers life cycle environmental critical points; compare different production techniques in order to identify and promote good environmental practices; allow the development of Product Categories Rules (PCR) and Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) in the framework of a National Demonstrative Programme developed within the Ecoflower project; populate the database of eVerdEE, a simplified LCA software (Buttol et al., 2006), with new datasets concerning the flowers life cycle; contribute to identify the significant environmental aspects in order to develop quantified criteria for the Ecoflower Terlizzi eco-label (type I label). This paper focuses only on the first point, i.e. the identification of the environmental hot spots. Systems Description

Flowers’ production in the Terlizzi district has quite different production systems, even when enterprises produce the same kind of flower. From the data supplied by the participating farms we know that the production process of roses in the Terlizzi area is carried out by growing the mother plants for an average of seven years. Young plants (multiplied through grafting) are bought from specialised farms that have registered the variety and guarantee that plants are immune from diseases. The young plants are then placed in soil or in containers used for the hydroponic system (trays or tanks) and filled with substrata (pumice, lapillus or perlite). In soilless cultivation, roses are not cut back but are left with stems, latent buds and leaves photosynthesising. Roses are kept healthy by scheduled pesticides treatments and continuously fed by the nutrient solution. None of the three enterprises which have soilless production uses closed cycle production, i.e. with complete recycling of the drained nutrient solution, but open or semi-closed systems are adopted. The evolution from latent bud to one ready to grow into a flowering stem is not stimulated by pruning but only by bending the base of the stems to change the level of hormones inside the plant and to encourage the latent buds to open, in this way forcing year round production. The production of stems is therefore very different for the two growing techniques: for cultivation in soil production it is 40-50 stems/m2 on yearly basis, while for hydroponic cultures it is close to 100-110 stems/m2 on yearly basis. In Terlizzi area during winter greenhouses dedicated to roses’ production require to be heated. All farms of this study use heating systems intensively, except Farm D which does not produce roses during winter and during the rest of the year occasionally uses some heating when needed. The producers of cyclamens in pots buy seedlings of selected varieties from national farms. Seedlings are delivered with root balls, in soil or peat, in polystyrene trays, transplanted mainly into PVC (polyvinylchloride) pots (sometimes terracotta pots are used) 16 cm in diameter and placed in greenhouses. A mortality rate of about 10 % of the supplied seedlings can be assumed. The cyclamens are cultivated from May to September in shaded greenhouses (without heating). During these months they grow and produce flower buds; then they are ready for sale. The same greenhouses are then used to produce other ornamental species (pelargonium, poinsettias, marigolds etc.). LCA Methodology

Life cycle assessment is a systematic set of procedures for compiling and

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examining the inputs and outputs of materials and energy and the associated environmental impacts of a product or service system throughout its life cycle. The LCA study was carried out according to ISO 14040 standards (ISO, 2006). Since the comparative results of this study have not been disclosed to the public (currently no enterprise has applied for obtaining the EPD in the Ecoflower Program), the critical review has not been carried out. After analysing the functions of the system studied, the following functional units has been adopted: 100 cut stems of roses and 6 pots of cyclamens, with their packaging. The boundaries of the system define the process units to be included in the LCA study. The boundaries adopted in this study (Fig. 1) include also building and maintenance of structures and equipments, as suggested in many LCA studies applied to agriculture cultivation (Audsley et al., 1997; Cowell and Clift, 1997; Gaillard, 1996; Hauschild, 2000; Milà I Canals, 2003; Wegener Sleeswijk et al., 1996). Use and end of life phases are not included because a common model of the consumers’ behaviour cannot be defined and these phases can be scarcely influenced by Terlizzi’s producers. Structures and equipments have been modelled including foundations, structural components, covering and other materials (floor covering, cables and poles, lanes, nets etc.), heating and refrigerating systems (the later for the preservation of flowers after cutting), cooling and/or ventilation systems, irrigation and/or fertirrigation systems, cultivation systems (soilless or in soil), electric equipments. The cultivation phase (Fig. 1), is characterised by the use of substrata, fertilizers, pesticides and other chemicals and by the consumption of fuels, electricity and water. To model the system and evaluate the environmental impacts, the GaBi 4 software was used. The software includes several internationally accepted methodologies to classify the input and output flows in the main environmental impact categories and characterize them. Table 1 shows the impact categories used in this study and the primary non-renewable energy consumption. The method selected for the classification and characterisation of the inputs and outputs of the inventory is the CML-2001, developed at the Institute of Environmental Sciences, Leiden University (Netherlands) (Guinée et al., 2001). We have not assessed the toxicity categories because too many active ingredients used in Terlizzi area are not characterised in this method. Work is in progress in order to overcome this problem. Data on energy, water, materials consumption and on structures and equipments were collected on-site and refer to the year 2005; background data come from various sources (commercial databases, literature, products technical sheets etc.). Table 2 summarises the sources of background data specific of the agricultural sector. Several hypotheses were necessary to complete the inventory, in particular for the evaluation of pesticides and fertilisers. For the production of pesticides we used the procedures suggested in literature, which consider only the total energy consumption for manufacturing of active ingredients and model the missing active ingredients with the active ingredients of the same chemical family or having the same type of use (insecticides, fungicides etc.). The emissions of pesticides into the environment during manufacturing have been neglected according to Audsley (Audsley et al., 1997). He estimates that they are from one hundred to one thousand times lower than the amount emitted during conventional use of pesticides. The evaluation of the pesticides emissions into air, water and soil has been carried out according to the dispersion model used by Antòn (Antòn, 2004) for greenhouse cultivation and taking into account the physical properties of the active ingredients used in the Terlizzi area. Production and transport of fertilizers have been included in the LCA study. Literature data regarding the balance of nutrients in soil and the removal of these by the crops can be found but refer to in field cultivation. In this work we have assumed the estimations of Antòn for crops in greenhouses (Antòn, 2004). To evaluate the macro-elements (N, P, K) dispersed into the environment during the use of fertilisers a distinction was made between in soil and soilless cultivation. In the former a balance was calculated between the quantity applied, the amount evaporated into the air and the amount absorbed by the plants, finally giving a value to the residual amount percolating into the water shed and into the soil (Antòn, 2004). For hydroponic cultivation we assumed that the residual nutrients are dispersed

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into the environment, although the producers are likely to use them on other cultivations such as olives or fruit orchards. We have preferred this conservative assumption because it is difficult to evaluate the absorption of nutrients for these crops, due to the variability of climatic and phenologic conditions and to the lack of literature data. The absorption of carbon dioxide by plants, the emissions of non-fossil CO2 and the energy stored in the plants have not been included in the LCA study. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Figures 2-8 show the main results of the study. The trend of the results is similar for the three farms that produce roses in hydroponic cultivation (Figs. 2-4), for the two farms that produce roses in soil cultivation (Figs. 5 and 6) and for the two farms that produce cyclamens in pots (Figs. 7 and 8). Consumption of fossil fuels for heating is the main cause of environmental burden in the production of rose stems. The farm D (Fig. 5) does not produce roses during the coldest months and uses the heating system only to avoid that temperatures drop to the biological minimum temperature or to the lethal minimum temperature. For this reason the relative contribution of heating fuel to the environmental impacts is lower than in Farm E. Reduction of fossil fuel consumption would be clearly an advantage, but if it were obtained by reducing greenhouse ventilation, a greater use of pesticides would be necessary. The production of seedlings for transplanting is the main contributor to the environmental impact of cyclamens in pots, as it requires the use of heating (Figs. 7 and 8). For both the productions of roses and cyclamens the structures and equipments give a not negligible contribution to the environmental impact generated by flowers production. In particular, greenhouses with glass covering have higher impacts than those covered with plastic film. The impact of cyclamens’ pots is not negligible due to the assumption that they are produced from virgin PVC. The variability of the on-site gathered data, especially energy and electricity consumption, caused by a not optimised management of the greenhouse microclimate, does not allow a detailed comparison of specific cultivation techniques. Anyway the study confirmed the necessity to focus the improvement interventions on some aspects. The environmental burdens of energy consumption can be reduced by more efficient use of energy (e.g. use of thermal screens in greenhouses, use of residual heat from industrial production) and by switching to renewable resources (e.g. solar panels, wind generators, biomass for cogeneration and trigeneration) or more environmentally friendly fuels (e.g. methane in place of diesel). Even if it is not possible to draw general conclusions when comparing the environmental behaviour of hydroponic and in soil cultivation, LCA highlighted that a critical point is the discharge of exhausted nutrient solution into the environment. This aspect can be improved by adopting closed loop recycling systems with the integration of simple but efficient disinfection systems for the nutrient solution. The adoption of secondary materials for pots and containers for seedlings and soilless cultivation could give a further contribution to the reduction of the environmental impact. The analysis of the inventory data suggests also some other improvements of the flowers life cycle management. The quantity of greenhouses plastic covering films and of residual biomass to be disposed of in the Terlizzi district should be managed at the area level to minimise the environmental impacts of their end of life and the common practice of using rainwater, given the scarcity of water supply in the Terlizzi area, should be further encouraged. CONCLUSIONS

The LCA study carried out in the Terlizzi district confirms the relevance of optimising the greenhouses microclimate management and highlights the necessity of a waste management at the area level. The variability of the resources consumption per functional unit shows that the greenhouse management should be improved and indicates the necessity of disseminating good environmental practices among the different actors of the area.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Research was performed within the European Commission funded EC-LIFE

"Ecoflower Terlizzi" project (Contract n° LIFE04 ENV/IT/000480). The experimental tests, the data processing and the editorial work must be shared, within the competencies of the research groups, equivalently among the Authors. Literature Cited Antòn, A.V. 2004. Utilizacion del Analisis del ciclo de vida en la evaluacion del impacto

ambiental del cultivo bajo invernadero mediterraneo. Ph.D. thesis, Univ. Politecnica de Catalunya. www.tdx.cesca.es/TESIS_UPC (in Spanish).

Audsley, E., Alber, S., Clift, R., Cowell, S., Crettaz, P., Gaillard, G., Hausheer, J., Jolliet, O., Kleijn, R., Mortensen, B., Pearce, D., Roger, E., Teulon, H., Weidema, B. and van Zeijts, H. 1997. Harmonisation of environmental life cycle assessment for agriculture. Final Rep. Concerted Action AIR3-CT94-2028. Silsoe Res. Inst., Silsoe, UK.

Bhat, G.M., English, B.C., Turhollow, A.F. and Nyangito, O.K. 1994, Energy in synthetic fertilizer and pesticides, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, ORNL/Sub/90-99732/2.

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Cowell, S.J. and Clift, R. 1997. Impact assessment for LCAs (Life Cycle Assessments) involving agricultural production. Intern. Jour. of Life Cycle Assessment. 2:99-103.

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EPA (Environmental Protection Agency, United States), 1995. AP-42, vol. 1: Stationary Point and Area Sources. Chapter 11: Mineral Products Industry. Perlite Processing. p.11.30/1-11.30/5, www.epa.gov/ttn/chief/ap42.

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production. www.fertilizer.org/ifa/publicat/PDF/1998_biblio_65.pdf. Lavutin, V.N., Mattis, A.R., Zaitsev, G.D. and Cheskidov, V.I. 2004. Blast free

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technology of mineral mining: State and prospects. Part II Estimation of the efficiency of various failure methods in opencast mining technologies, J. of Mining Science, 40:173-181.

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Tables Table 1. Environmental impact categories and Primary non-renewable energy

consumption. Impact category Acronym Indicator Depletion of the abiotic resources ADP kg Sb eq. Climate change GWP 100 kg of CO2 eq. Ozone layer depletion ODP kg R-11 eq. Acidification AP kg of SO eq. 2

kg of POEutrophication EP 43- eq.

Formation of photochemical oxidants (photochemical smog)

POCP kg of ethylene eq.

Primary non-renewable energy consumption Energy MJ Table 2. Sources of background data specific of the agricultural sector. Background data Sources Substrata (expanded perlite and pumice) EPA, 1995; Lavutin et al., 2004 Fertilisers production Davis and Haglund, 1999; Kongshaung,

1998; Delucchi, 2003; EFMA, 2003; Audsley et al., 1997; K+S, 2002; Bhat, 1994.

Pesticides production Audsley et al., 1997; Antòn, 2004; Green, 1987; Hartley e Kidd, 1987

Seedlings interview with an Italian producer; Rampinini, 2004.

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Figures

C o n s t r u c t i o n a n d m a i n t e n a n c e o f s t r u c t u r e s a n d

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Fig. 1. System boundaries of the LCA study.

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Fig. 3. Results of soilless cultivated roses,

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Fig. 5. Results of in soil cultivated roses,

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0% 100%

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Fig. 7. Results of cyclamens, Farm F.

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Heating fuelElectricityFertilizersPackagingPesticides Struct.& equip.Baby plant

Fig. 8. Results of cyclamens, Farm G.

Fig. 9. Legend of Fig. 2-8.

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