Please compute the environmental impact of the food item of your choice (assigned to you in the class) using the Life Cycle Assessment methodology. Please identify the goal and scope of your analysis, the life cycle model and the system boundary, state your assumptions, the functional unit and the life cycle inventory data used along with the sources. You should estimate the carbon footprint for the lifecycle of this food item. But you should also comment on one more life cycle impact assessment indicator from amongst water depletion, human health, human toxicity, air/water/plastic pollution, etc. for this item. For example, how much water is used from the cradle to grave of this product or what are the health concerns with the consumption of this food item, etc.
Please create your own supply chain geographically to know the distances for where your farm, processing unit, warehouse, retailer, etc. are.
Please talk to a farmer/farm expert/food processing expert about the methods used in your supply chain and share their insights with us.
You can watch videos, read articles to understand the entire lifecycle for this food item. You can use generative AI tools for this assignment. Please validate values from other sources such as food databases, research papers to make sure that the life cycle inventory values for inputs/processes values are reasonable. Share the most important insights about your findings textually and visually.
Please also find the consumption of this food item at the country level and how can the environmental impact be brought down for this food item (for example, you can also think of substitution of this food item with another food item).
Please estimate the carbon footprint (in kgCO2e) of your food consumption on a yearly basis. Please use this spreadsheet as a template for your computation. Please share the calculations for each food item. Please also express your annual carbon footprint from your food consumption in the form of histograms, pie charts, etc to know which food items lead to higher GHG emissions. Please share your insights from this analysis.
15th September 2024
Please compute the environmental impact for atleast two impact categories (e.g. global warming potential, resource depletion, particulate matter formation potential, etc.) of the product chosen by you using the ISO 14040 Life Cycle Assessment methodology. Please identify the goal and scope of your analysis, the life cycle model and the system boundary, the functional unit and the life cycle inventory data used along with the sources. Please perform the life cycle impact assessment for this product and provide interpretation for this analysis. Please suggest a way to reduce the environmental impact for this product.
Please estimate the carbon footprint (in kgCO2e) in products from cradle to gate for the products used by you. Please use this spreadsheet as a template for your computation. Please also suggest which products have the highest carbon footprint using histograms, pie charts, etc. Please share your insights from this analysis.
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7th October 2024