Page 217 - Biofuels for a More Sustainable Future

194 Biofuels for a More Sustainable Future

5 Results and discussion
5.1 Human health and ecosystem quality impacts
Table 6.9 provides the main findings from LCA and LCC of the four bio-
diesel systems in Ha Noi and Quang Ninh. Unfortunately, biodiesel systems
in Ha Noi showed higher impacts on human health than petrodiesel. The
more biodiesel existed in the blend, the more impacts on people’s health
were observed. In Quang Ninh, nevertheless, the results indicated that
the more biodiesel existed in the blend, the fewer impacts on people’s health
it had. Fig. 6.3 describes the share in total impacts of main processes in the life
cycle of the B100 system that can thoroughly explain the different impacts of
the two areas. Accordingly, the extraction of seed and the combustion of fuel
were the first and the second most significant contributors to human health
impacts in Ha Noi and vice versa in Quang Ninh.
Due to the higher concentration of NO x in the exhaust gas of biodie-
sel (Table 6.3), the combustion of biodiesel in targeted vehicles enlarged
its impacts on human health (Fig. 6.4). Nevertheless, thanks to the better
weathering behaviors (Section 4.1), biodiesel blends showed a noticeable
reductioninhealthimpacts whenused incruiseboats. Thereforeonlyin
Quang Ninh, where cruise boats consume more than half of the total
annual fuel, biodiesel consumption could promote the mitigation of
human health impacts. Moreover, a certain amount of solvent releases
in oil extraction phase was another driver of human health impact
increase. Since the Hibiscus-Vernicia biodiesel in Ha Noi was supposed
to utilize a substantial amount of seed oils, especially Vernicia oil, to pro-
duce Hibiscus-Vernicia biodiesel blend and several coproducts, its oil
extraction phase presented 54% of total human health impact in the
entire system.
Overall, the total human health impact of the B100 systems in Ha Noi
and Quang Ninh were 2.7 times higher and 2.4 times lower than that caused
by the petrodiesel system, respectively.
In the context of ecosystem quality, the burden on the ecosystem of bio-
diesel systems was significantly higher than the petrodiesel system in both
areas. Most of the impacts were owing to the application of fertilizers in
Hibiscus-Vernicia and Pongamia cultivation (in both areas) and chemicals
in oil extraction (in Ha Noi case), which accounted for >80% of tal ecosys-
tem impacts.