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© 2025 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

Based on Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and ISO standards, we compared the global environmental sustainability (ES) of two technologies that process the organic fraction of municipal solid waste (OFMSW) in Mexico. The first technology was a biorefinery (BRF) known as HMEZSNN-BRF (abbreviation for Hydrogen-Methane-Extraction-Enzyme-Saccharification/Nanoproduction Biorefinery); it produces the gas biofuels hydrogen (H) and methane (M), organic acids (E), enzymes (Z), saccharified liquors (S), and bionanobioparticles (BNBPs) in a nanoproduction stage (NN). The second technology was incineration with energy recovery (IER). An LCA was performed with a functional unit (FU) of 1000 kg of OFMSW. The BRF generates 166.4 kWh/FU (600 MJ) of net electricity, along with bioproducts such as volatile organic acids (38 kg), industrial enzyme solution (1087 kg), and BNBPs (40 kg). The IER only produces 393 net kWh/FU electricity and 5653 MJ/FU heat. The characterization potential environmental impacts (PEIs) were assessed using SimaPro software, and normalized PEIs (NPEIs) were calculated accordingly. We defined a new variable alpha and the indices σ-τ plane for quantifying the ES. The higher the alpha, the lower the ES. Alpha was the sum of the eighteen NPEIs aligned with the ISO standards. The contributions to PEI and NPEI were also analyzed. Four NPEIs were the highest in both technologies, i.e., freshwater and marine ecotoxicities and human non-carcinogenic and carcinogenic toxicities. For the three first categories, the NPEI values corresponding to IER were much higher than those of the BRF (58.6 and 8.7 person*year/FU freshwater toxicity; 93.5 and 13.6 marine ecotoxicity; 12.1 and 1.8 human non-carcinogenic toxicity; 13.7 and 13.9 human carcinogenic toxicity, for IER and the BRF, respectively). The total α values were 179.1 and 40.7 (person*yr)/FU for IER and the BRF, respectively. Thus, the ES of IER was four times lower than that of the BRF. Values of σ = 0.592 and τ = −0.368 were found; the point defined by these coordinates in the σ-τ plane was located in Quadrant IV. This result confirmed that the BRF in this work is more environmentally sustainable (with restrictions) than the IER in Mexico for the treatment of the OFMSW.

Details

Title
Evaluation of Environmental Sustainability of Biorefinery and Incineration with Energy Recovery Based on Life Cycle Assessment †
Author
Yáñez-Vergara, Alejandra Gabriela 1 ; Poggi-Varaldo, Héctor Mario 2 ; Pérez-Morales, Guadalupe 3 ; Sotelo-Navarro, Perla Xochitl 3 ; Padilla-Viveros, América Alejandra 1 ; Matsumoto-Kuwahara, Yasuhiro 4 ; Ponce-Noyola, Teresa 5 ; Sánchez-Pérez Rocío 6 

 Programa Transdisciplinario en Desarrollo Científico y Tecnológico para la Sociedad, Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Avenida Instituto Politécnico Nacional 2508, Gustavo A. Madero, San Pedro Zacatenco, Ciudad de México 07360, Mexico; [email protected] (A.G.Y.-V.); [email protected] (A.A.P.-V.) 
 Programa Transdisciplinario en Desarrollo Científico y Tecnológico para la Sociedad, Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Avenida Instituto Politécnico Nacional 2508, Gustavo A. Madero, San Pedro Zacatenco, Ciudad de México 07360, Mexico; [email protected] (A.G.Y.-V.); [email protected] (A.A.P.-V.), Environmental Biotechnology and Renewable Energies R&D Group, Department Biotechnology and Bioengineering, Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Avenida Instituto Politécnico Nacional 2508, Gustavo A. Madero, San Pedro Zacatenco, Ciudad de México 07360, Mexico; [email protected] (G.P.-M.); [email protected] (P.X.S.-N.) 
 Environmental Biotechnology and Renewable Energies R&D Group, Department Biotechnology and Bioengineering, Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Avenida Instituto Politécnico Nacional 2508, Gustavo A. Madero, San Pedro Zacatenco, Ciudad de México 07360, Mexico; [email protected] (G.P.-M.); [email protected] (P.X.S.-N.) 
 Departamento de Electrónica del Estado Sólido, Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Avenida Instituto Politécnico Nacional 2508, Gustavo A. Madero, San Pedro Zacatenco, Ciudad de México 07360, Mexico; [email protected] 
 Microbial Genetics Group, Department of Biotechnology and Bioengineering, Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Avenida Instituto Politécnico Nacional 2508, Gustavo A. Madero, San Pedro Zacatenco, Ciudad de México 07360, Mexico; [email protected] 
 Centro Mexicano para la Producción Más Limpia, Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Avenida Acueducto S/N, Ticomán, Gustavo A. Madero, Ciudad de México 07340, Mexico; [email protected] 
First page
232
Publication year
2025
Publication date
2025
Publisher
MDPI AG
e-ISSN
23115637
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
3194599092
Copyright
© 2025 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.