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List of contributors
Michael Bampaou, Chemical Process and Energy Resources Institute (CPERI), Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH), Thessaloniki, Greece
Elias Christoforou, School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Frederick University, Nicosia, Cyprus
Paris A. Fokaides, School of Engineering, Frederick University, Nicosia, Cyprus
Guillermo Garcia-Garcia
Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, The University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
Department of Agrifood System Economics, Centre ‘Camino de Purchil’, Institute of Agricultural and Fisheries Research and Training (IFAPA), Granada, Spain
Eskinder Gemechu, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada
Phoebe-Zoe Georgali, School of Engineering, Frederick University, Nicosia, Cyprus
Effrosyni Giama, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
Giorgos Kardaras
Chemical Process and Energy Resources Institute (CPERI), Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH), Thessaloniki, Greece
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Western Macedonia, Greece
Panagiota Kona ii, School of Engineering, Frederick University, Nicosia, Cyprus
Tzouliana Kraia, Chemical Process and Energy Resources Institute (CPERI), Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH), Thessaloniki, Greece
Amit Kumar, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada
Angeliki Kylili, Department of Environment, Ministry of Agriculture, Rural Development and Environment, Cyprus
Paola Le ieri, Department of Chemical Engineering, University College London, London, United Kingdom
M. A. Parvez Mahmud, School of Engineering, Deakin University, Geelong, VIC, Australia
Stephen McCord, Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, The University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
Maria Milousi, Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Western Macedonia, Koila, Greece
Abayomi Olufemi Oni, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada
Kyriakos Panopoulos, Chemical Process and Energy Resources Institute (CPERI), Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH), Thessaloniki, Greece
Andrea Paulillo, Department of Chemical Engineering, University College London, London, United Kingdom
Md Mustafizur Rahman, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada
Manolis Souliotis, Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Western Macedonia, Koila, Greece
Alberto Striolo, School of Chemical, Biological and Materials Engineering, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, United States
Peter Styring, Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, The University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
Nahin Tasmin, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Rajshahi University of Engineering & Technology, Kazla, Rajshahi, Bangladesh
Sandra Venghaus Forschungszentrum Jülich, Jülich, Germany School of Business and Economics, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany
About the editors
Dr.-Ing. Paris A. Fokaides is an Associate Professor at the School of Engineering of Frederick University, Cyprus, and a research mentor at Kaunas University of Technology, Lithuania. In Frederick University, Paris is lecturing the courses of Fluid Mechanics and Heat Transfer at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, as well
as the courses of Sustainable Energy Resources, and Energy Design of Buildings in the Masters Programme of Energy Engineering, which he also coordinates. Paris holds a PhD from the University of Karlsruhe, in Germany in the field of Process Engineering and a Diploma in Mechanical Engineering of Aristotle University in Thessaloniki, Greece. Paris research is related to the promotion of Industry 4.0 practices for the assessment of the energy and sustainability performance of energy technologies and smart buildings, as well as the field of digitization and analysis of energy related processes. Paris leads the Sustainable Energy Research Group at Frederick University, an ISO 9001 certified self-funded research team consisting of 10 FTE researchers, involved in numerous European and national funded R&I activities. Paris is also Editor in Chief of the International Journal of Sustainable Energy, and member in numerous editorial boards of scientific journals. As of mid-22, Paris has authored and co-authored over 125 Scopus indexed studies, and has an h-index of 30.
Dr. Angeliki Kylili is an Environment Officer at the Department of Environment of the Ministry of Agriculture, Rural Development and Environment of the Republic of Cyprus. She has studied BSc Environmental Science and MSc Energy and Environment at the University of Leeds, United Kingdom, and has obtained her PhD in Civil Engineering with the Sustainable Energy Research Group (SERG) at Frederick University, Cyprus. Her research is primarily concerned with Life Cycle Assessment and the exploitation of renewable energy sources. She is the author and co-author of 37 publications in international peer-reviewed journals and 4 book chapters, with an h-index of 20. Her current duties as an Environment Officer concern the development and effective implementation of the national and European policy framework for the protection of the environment. Angeliki is a national focal point
for the Transport, Health and Environment Pan-European Programme (THE PEP) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), and she is also responsible for following through and providing relevant national contributions to the work of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Commi ee on Environmental Policy of UNECE.
Ms. Phoebe-Zoe Georgali is a Mechanical Engineer (BSc Mechanical Engineering) graduate from the Technological Education Institute of Chalkida, Greece, 2012 and Energy Engineer postgraduate (MSc Sustainable Energy Systems) at Frederick University, Cyprus, 2017. Since September 2020, Ms. Georgali is a PhD Candidate at Frederick University as a member of the
Sustainable Energy Research Group (SERG), engaging with state-ofthe-art research regarding sustainable and waste energy technologies, as well as LCA of products and services.
Section A OUTLINE
Chapter 1 Introduction: environmental assessment of renewable energy and storage technologies: current status
C H A P T E R 1
Introduction: environmental assessment of renewable energy and storage technologies: current
status Panagiota Kona ii and Paris A. Fokaides, School of Engineering, Frederick University, Nicosia, Cyprus
Content
OUTLINE
References 8
We live in an era where the term renewable energy has been linked to environmental-friendly and sustainable practices for converting natural resources to end energy. Countries and organizations around the world, one after another, set quantitative targets for promoting energy production with the use of renewable energy sources. The European Union (EU) is a pioneer in this field, with
ambitious goals dating back to the early 2000s, which are currently being remarkably achieved. The infamous EU target of the triple 20 for 2020 with the reference year of 2005, that is, 20% energy savings, 20% promotion of the use of renewable energy sources, and 20% reduction of greenhouse gases (GHG), was not only achieved but gave way to a more ambitious goal for 2030 and 2050, resulting from the Green Deal (European Environmental Agency, 2021). The member states of the EU are moving fast towards achieving the ambitious goal of 55% energy savings by 2030, in accordance with the Fitfor55 policy framework (European Parliament, 2021). In addition to the ambitious European program, the United Nations is moving fast with the Sustainable Development Goals program, a scheme within which optimistic sustainability goals should be achieved in 17 areas, including green and sustainable energy, as well as sustainable cities and societies (United Nations, 2021).
Under these conditions, the promotion of renewable energy sources and related technologies constitutes the mainstream in the energy production field. The continuous development that prevails in the design and implementation of new renewable energy projects worldwide is accompanied by both research activities to develop more energy-efficient applications, but also environmentally smarter solutions (Christoforou and Fokaides, 2016). Inevitably, the point has been reached where the term renewable energy, in itself, is not a panacea, the answer to every solution, but should be evaluated and judged, with objective criteria (Kylili et al., 2016). A technological application, for example, for the conversion of solar energy into electricity, which requires large volumes of raw material, is not environmentally preferable, compared to another solution, which with the same degree of efficiency but with much smaller quantities of raw material, can convert the same amount of solar energy into another useful form (Souliotis et al., 2018). Therefore, the question of quantifying the environmental impact of the use of renewable energy sources reaches a point where it can no longer be answered qualitatively but needs to be substantiated, quantitative answers.
The answer to the question of how we can quantify the environmental impact of renewable energy sources is found in life
p gy cycle analysis. Life cycle analysis is a well-tested, well-established methodology that can quantify the environmental impact of any product or service throughout its life cycle. From the beginning of the 1990s, when this method appeared, until its first standardization in 1996, today, worldwide, it is considered the most comprehensive methodology for quantifying the environmental impact (Arnaoutakis et al., 2019). Since 1996 and its standardization through the ISO 14040 series standards, life cycle analysis has been the most widely used method of determining environmental impact (Christoforou et al., 2016). ISO 14040:2006 describes the principles and framework for life cycle assessment (LCA), including the definition of the goal and scope of the LCA, the life cycle inventory analysis (LCI) phase, the life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) phase, the life cycle interpretation phase, reporting and critical review of the LCA, limitations of the LCA, the relationship between the LCA phases, and conditions for the use of value choices and optional elements (EN ISO 14040, 2006). The environmental analysis of renewable energy sources is no exception in relation to the environmental burden determination practices that can be followed. Decision-making on new installations in the field of energy production and storage using sustainable energy resources should be justified on specific quantitative parameters. Given the growing rate of installation of renewable energy and storage applications, the integral sustainability aspect of the environmental assessment should also be quantified in a similar manner to the technical and financial parameters (Fokaides and Christoforou, 2016). The recent development of comprehensive environmental assessment tools such as the life cycle assessment (LCA) and the product environmental footprint (PEF), as well as the scientific work conducted in these fields, allows for the development of a joint framework to evaluate different technologies on a common basis concerning their environmental perspectives (Pommeret et al., 2017). Despite the numerous scientific publications in this research field, a compilation of the justified knowledge in this topic is still not available for the scientific and engineering community (Christoforou and Fokaides, 2018).
Efforts to globalize the environmental assessment of services and products with the use of LCA date back to 2013. Particularly, in order to promote and establish LCA as the most common approach for the environmental assessment of services and products, the United Nations initiated in 2013 the Global Guidance on Environmental Life Cycle Impact Assessment Indicators (GLAM) initiative (United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), 2021). The aim of UNEP GLAM, under the United Nations Environmental Programme umbrella, is to improve worldwide agreement on environmental LCIA indicators, delivering tangible and specific recommendations for diverse environmental indicators and classification factors used (LCIA). The UNEP GLAM project is implemented by an international expert task force, which drafts and announces recommendations for different topic areas. Advancements are overviewed on a regular basis by expert consultation workshops and roundtable discussions organized among experts and stakeholders of the field. The UNEP GLAM experts are chosen from five different pools, which cover all interested parties in the field of LCA, including users of life cycle information, such as governmental and intergovernmental organizations, industries, NGOs, and members of the academia, life cycle thinking studies consultants, and LCIA methods and tools developers. The initiative was organized in three phases:
• In the first phase, which lasted from 2013 until 2016, specific impact categories were discussed and quantified, including GHG emissions and impacts of climate change, health impacts of fine particulate ma er, human health impacts, land use related impacts on biodiversity, water use related impacts water scarcity as well as cross-cu ing issues.
• The second phase, which was implemented from 2017 until 2019, analyzed specific impact indicators, including acidification and eutrophication, land use impacts on soil quality, ecotoxicity natural resources and mineral primary resources, human toxicity as well as cross-cu ing issues.
