Carbon Footprint Calculation of an AEH-technology Residential House from Cradle to Grave
Gerasimenko, Olga (2015)
Gerasimenko, Olga
Metropolia Ammattikorkeakoulu
2015
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 1.0 Finland
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-201505198972
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-201505198972
Tiivistelmä
This thesis presents the carbon footprint calculation of a Finnish active energy house (AEH), which uses a range of innovative energy saving technologies. The calculation is made for all the stages of the 50-year life-cycle from cradle to grave.
The results of the study take into account footprints of all materials production, materials transportation to the site, commissioning and demolition phases with all the waste and its transportation to waste treatment facilities and also the 50-year operation cycle of the house.
As the house is mostly made of wood and wood-based materials, their carbon storage capacity is used as a benefit so that the CO2 emissions from wooden structures for a 50-year life cycle decrease by one half. The other benefit of the wooden structure shows during the final disposal phase, as the structures can be used in waste-to-energy plants to produce energy. The energy is allocated for the energy use during the whole life cycle. Due to special construction arrangements, the electricity need for the house is extremely low. Thus when the bioenergy form the final phase is being considered, the energy use is not only evened out, but also energy is left in excess.
According to the results, the mass of the whole house structure is 83.6 tones and the net carbon footprint for all the materials is 24 tons of CO2-eq. Due to the fact that most of the structure is wood-based, carbon uptake was accounted for 50 years, resulting in the final carbon footprint of the structure being reduced to 13 tons of CO2-eq. Three sources of emissions were considered in the calculations: transportation, contruction+demolition+renovations and construction waste. Transportation was found to be the biggest emission cause resulting in 0.9 tons of CO2-eq. Footprints of construction waste and building activities seemed to be minor sources of emissions, being 0.3 and 0.2 tons of CO2-eq, respectively. When it comes to electricity demand for the whole 50-year life cycle, the emissions from electricity production were calculated to be 15.8 tons CO2-eq. When energy that can be produced from the house materials after demolition was allocated to the electricity demand calculation, the result was a benefit of -5 tons CO2-eq. The possibility of recycling some of the materials also gave a benefit of 0.546 tons CO2-eq.
After taking all the emissions and uptakes into account, the final result for the amount of GHG emitted for the life cycle of the active house from cradle to grave was 8.7 tons of CO2-eq, which is 20 times less than the carbon footprint of a standard house.
The results of the study take into account footprints of all materials production, materials transportation to the site, commissioning and demolition phases with all the waste and its transportation to waste treatment facilities and also the 50-year operation cycle of the house.
As the house is mostly made of wood and wood-based materials, their carbon storage capacity is used as a benefit so that the CO2 emissions from wooden structures for a 50-year life cycle decrease by one half. The other benefit of the wooden structure shows during the final disposal phase, as the structures can be used in waste-to-energy plants to produce energy. The energy is allocated for the energy use during the whole life cycle. Due to special construction arrangements, the electricity need for the house is extremely low. Thus when the bioenergy form the final phase is being considered, the energy use is not only evened out, but also energy is left in excess.
According to the results, the mass of the whole house structure is 83.6 tones and the net carbon footprint for all the materials is 24 tons of CO2-eq. Due to the fact that most of the structure is wood-based, carbon uptake was accounted for 50 years, resulting in the final carbon footprint of the structure being reduced to 13 tons of CO2-eq. Three sources of emissions were considered in the calculations: transportation, contruction+demolition+renovations and construction waste. Transportation was found to be the biggest emission cause resulting in 0.9 tons of CO2-eq. Footprints of construction waste and building activities seemed to be minor sources of emissions, being 0.3 and 0.2 tons of CO2-eq, respectively. When it comes to electricity demand for the whole 50-year life cycle, the emissions from electricity production were calculated to be 15.8 tons CO2-eq. When energy that can be produced from the house materials after demolition was allocated to the electricity demand calculation, the result was a benefit of -5 tons CO2-eq. The possibility of recycling some of the materials also gave a benefit of 0.546 tons CO2-eq.
After taking all the emissions and uptakes into account, the final result for the amount of GHG emitted for the life cycle of the active house from cradle to grave was 8.7 tons of CO2-eq, which is 20 times less than the carbon footprint of a standard house.