A life cycle assessment of the environmental impacts of a beef system in the USA

Abstract

Purpose The need to assess the sustainability attributes of the United States beef industry is underscored by its importance to food security locally and globally. A life cycle assessment (LCA) of the US beef value chain was conducted to develop baseline information on the environmental impacts of the industry includ`ing metrics of the cradle-to-farm gate (feed production, cowcalf, and feedlot operations) and post-farm gate (packing, case-ready, retail, restaurant, and consumer) segments. Methods Cattle production (cradle-to-farm gate) data were obtained using the integrated farm system model (IFSM) supported with production data from the Roman L. Hruska US Meat Animal Research Center (USMARC). Primary data for the packing and case-ready phases were obtained from packers that jointly processed nearly 60% of US beef while retail and restaurant primary data represented 8 and 6%, respectively, of each sector. Consumer data were obtained from public databases and literature. The functional unit or consumer benefit (CB) was 1 kg of consumed, boneless, edible beef. The relative environmental impacts of processes along the full beef value chain were assessed using a third party validated BASF Corporation Eco-Efficiency Analysis methodology. Results and discussion Value chain LCA results indicated that the feed and cattle production phases were the largest contributors to most environmental impact categories. Impact metrics included water emissions (7005 L diluted water eq/CB), cumulative energy demand (1110 MJ/CB), and land use (47.4 m 2 a eq/CB). Air emissions were acidification potential (726 g SO 2 eq/CB), photochemical ozone creation potential (146.5 g C 2 H 4 eq/CB), global warming potential (48.4 kg CO 2 eq/CB), and ozone depletion potential (1686 μg CFC 11 eq/CB). The remaining metrics calculated were abiotic depletion potential (10.3 mg Ag eq/CB), consumptive water use (2558 L eq/CB), and solid waste (369 g municipal waste eq/CB). Of the relative points adding up to 1 for each impact category, the feed phase contributed 0.93 to the human toxicity potential. Conclusions This LCA is the first of its kind for beef and has been third party verified in accordance with ISO 14040:2006a and 14044:2006b and 14045:2012 standards. An expanded nationwide study of beef cattle production is now being performed with region-specific cattle production data aimed at identifying region-level benchmarks and opportunities for further improvement in US beef sustainability.

Assessment of water and energy use at process level in the U.S. beef packing industry: Case study in a typical U.S. large‐size plant

“…As shown in Table , overall water usage of the plant was 4,947.0 ± 374.6 L/t LCW. This amount of water use in the sector of beef packing is less than 1% compared with the water footprint of the whole beef supply chain from a life cycle perspective (Asem‐Hiablie, Battagliese, Stackhouse‐Lawson, & Alan Rotz, ; Beckett & Oltjen, ). However, the water use in beef packing plants is still a significant share of water consumption in its community and the resulting wastewater poses massive threats on its surrounding water bodies (Bustillo‐Lecompte & Mehrvar, ).…”

A life cycle analysis (LCA) primer for the agricultural community

“…A life cycle analysis approach which looks at the direct burdens of specific product or portion of a life cycle (McManus & Taylor, 2015 -Hiablie et al, 2018;FAO, 2018), and agroecosystem hierarchy required to produce farm and field system inputs.…”

A Comparative Life Cycle Assessment of Meat Trays Made of Various Packaging Materials

“…As investigated by Wikström et al [16], food waste might also be influenced by packaging solutions. Environmental impacts caused by meat are much higher compared to that from packaging and can be around 20 kg CO 2 -eq./500 g in the case of US beef [37]. Secondly, the choice of tray material and tray design influences the shelf life of meat and therefore could be a relevant aspect.…”