Pelletizing compost derived from agricultural by-products: an economic and environmental assessment

Abstract

This paper presents a comparative Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Life Cycle Costing (LCC) study of traditional compost derived from agricultural by-products and pelletized compost, to assess whether substantial differences occur in terms of environmental impacts and costs. Indeed, the production of compost for fertilizing soil has demonstrated several agronomic, economic and environmental benefits, but it also shows some critical issues related to storage, handling, and transportation. These problems could be overcome by the pelletization process. One of the main novelties of this manuscript is represented by the selection of a proper functional unit (FU), which corresponds to the carbon content, instead of the more common mass-based FU. Overall, results showed better environmental performance of the pellet over the compost; LCC also demonstrated that pellets are an economically comparable alternative.