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Olive pomace versus natural gas for methanol production: a life cycle assessment

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Abstract

Increasing demand for methanol production and global competition for the use of natural resources are key issues in finding new and environmentally routes for methanol production. In this work, life cycle assessment was performed using the software SimaPro v9 to analyze the environmental impact of methanol production process from olive pomace and compare with natural gas route. The main stages considered in the methanol production from olive pomace were olive production, olive oil extraction, and methanol production. In addition, the methanol production in turn can be divided in three main processes: olive pomace gasification, syngas purification, and methanol production which were also evaluated individually. Finally, the global environmental impacts associated with the methanol production from olive pomace were compared with a conventional methanol production from natural gas. This assessment determined that the production of methanol from the olive pomace had a greater environmental impact for all the categories studied except the one related to the shortage of fossil fuels. These results were directly related to the technical performance of the processes.

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All data generated and analyzed during this study are included in this published article.

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Funding

The authors received financial support from the Spanish government (Grant No. FPU15/02653) and the “Aceites Garcia de la Cruz” olive oil mill.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Castilla-La Mancha, Avda. Camilo José Cela, 12 13071, Ciudad Real, Spain

    María Puig-Gamero, María Magdalena Parascanu, Paula Sánchez & Luz Sanchez-Silva

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  1. María Puig-Gamero
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  2. María Magdalena Parascanu
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  3. Paula Sánchez
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  4. Luz Sanchez-Silva
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Contributions

María Puig-Gamero: Conceptualization, data curation, formal analysis, investigation, and writing. María Magdalena Parascanu: Conceptualization, data curation, formal analysis, and investigation. Luz Sanchez- Silva: Conceptualization, funding acquisition, investigation, and project administration. Paula Sánchez: Conceptualization, formal analysis, funding acquisition, and project administration.

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Correspondence to Luz Sanchez-Silva.

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Puig-Gamero, M., Parascanu, M.M., Sánchez, P. et al. Olive pomace versus natural gas for methanol production: a life cycle assessment. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 30335–30350 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-12710-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-12710-6

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