Database

Working Groups / Database

In Brazil there are a small number of datasets that represent the environmental reality of Brazilian commerce and industry. On the other hand, we have seen the growth in demand for LCA studies and the growth in interest for type III environmental statements. This initiative aims to increase the quantity and quality of inventories that represent Brazil, through a thorough adaptation of the datasets that will be granted by ecoinvent (EI) based on a collaboration agreement. The results of this work will be submitted to the SICV (the Brazilian LCA inventories database), so that they can be made available to the entire LCA community, in addition to being integrated into the EI database, which will be responsible for maintaining and updating these datasets in later versions of the database. The proposal evolves in phases, the first of which would be the "Cornerstone", with adaptations of base and priority datasets. It is proposed that four base datasets (pillars) be adapted to better represent the reality of Brazil: Electric Energy, Diesel, Natural Gas and Road Transportation Cargo. These datasets were chosen because they make a significant contribution to various industrial processes, i.e., they are at the base of the economy and because in Brazil there are specificities that justify differentiating them from the international data available in EI.

Dataset(Cornerstone) Main differences between ecoinvent 3.6 datasets and Brazilian current situation Proposed recontextualization
Electricity Datasets for the Brazilian electricity mix were recently updated in the framework of the SRI project. Therefore, these datasets will only be reconnected to Oil&Gas datasets recontextualized in the present study. Connecting the recontextualized natural gas dataset, tobetter represent the environmental impacts of thermal power plants.
Diesel The inventory for Brazilian Diesel production was recently published in ecoinvent, also as an output of the SRI project. For the present study, this dataset was checked with the last available official national statistics. All considerations in the published dataset are in line with the current situation, besides differences in the distribution of the final product to consumers. - Connecting the recontextualized Brazilian petroleum to the currently available Brazilian diesel;
- Estimate distances and transport modes for the distribution of diesel in Brazil.
Biodiesel Brazilian vegetable oil methyl ester from soybean is available in ecoinvent with global esterification data. Whereas the major sources of Brazilian biodiesel are soybean oil and animal fat. A new average Brazilian biodiesel dataset with raw material share according to national statistics. Moreover, process data from 19 esterification plants reported to the RenovaBio (National Biofuel Policy) are considered.
Petroleum and Natural Gas Datasets for combined production of petroleum and gas available in ecoinvent are mainly defined by the exploration location (on-shore or off-shore), production yields, energy use and emissions to air and water. Moreover, the environmental burdens related to imported material are considered. - Amount of natural gas consumed in turbines during exploration and production;
- Amount of flaring and venting;
- Amount of produced water;
- Petroleum and natural gas production yields (on-shore and off-shore);
- Imported petroleum and natural gas;
- High-pressure natural gas transport system operation.
Road Freight Transport - Fuel type changes, as the use of either 500 ppm sulfur diesel or low-sulfur diesel and the 12% biodiesel blend;
- Freight load factors among the different lorry size categories.
- Fuel type changes and its impacts on emission factors;
- Regulated emission factors from emission tests of the national vehicle production and import (CETESB, 2019);
- Freight load factors according to national statistics.