| Responsible Department | Department of Agriculture and Ecology
80 % Forest & Landscape 20 % | ||||||||||||||
| Earliest Possible Year | BSc. 3 year | ||||||||||||||
| Duration | One block | ||||||||||||||
| Credits | 7.5 (ECTS) | ||||||||||||||
| Level of Course | Joint BSc and MSc | ||||||||||||||
| Examination | Final Examination written examination and oral examination All aids allowed Description of Examination: Evaluation of individual report on chosen case. Individual oral examination in report and theory. Weight: Individual oral examination 60%. Individual report 40 %. 7-point scale, internal examiner | ||||||||||||||
| Requirement for Attending Exam | Submitted group report | ||||||||||||||
| Organisation of Teaching | Lectures and exercises with a pre-defined case-study and smaller exercises. LCA study of a product or a biological production system of the students' interest/study direction. Sessions about interesting aspects of LCA and related topics. | ||||||||||||||
| Block Placement | Block 4 Week Structure: A | ||||||||||||||
| Language of Instruction | English | ||||||||||||||
| Optional Prerequisites | 280002 230009 Environmental Chemistry of Biological Systems or similar qualifications in environmental science are essential, in particular for 3rd y BSc students. | ||||||||||||||
| Course Content | |||||||||||||||
| Life cycle assessment is a multi-disciplinary tool that is used to assess all the environmental impacts associated with the production of a product or a production system. The tool is increasingly applied as an aid in political decision making and knowledge about the tool is therefore highly relevant to students interested in environmental science and management. The course covers general LCA theory: 1. Goal and scope definition 2. Inventory analysis 3. Life impact assessment 4. Interpretation of results This include important subjects like definition of functional unit, system boundary delimitation, allocation, system expansion, change-oriented versus accounting LCA, consequential versus attributional modeling. Impact assessment methodology and sensitivity analysis. Special emphasis will be given to various environmental and resource conservation problems that arise in conjunction with products of biological production systems (e.g. horticultural crops, field crops, production animals, aquaculture, food industry, pharmaceutics). The students are also introduced to the concepts of exergy/emergy and cost benefit analysis (CBA) and illustrative examples of CBA based on value transfer will be given. | |||||||||||||||
| Teaching and learning Methods | |||||||||||||||
| The course is divided in two major parts: 1. Introduction to the theory, principles and application of LCA; 2. Use of the acquired LCA competences on a self-chosen case-study of a product or process of a biological production system. In the first part, the general theory of life cycle assessment will be presented the form of lectures and exercises and the students will be acquainted with life cycle thinking. In addition, they get hand-on experience with LCA software and acquainted with the possibilities of its use through exercises. A case study and several small exercises will illustrate the principles relevant to biological production systems such as land use, eutrophication, global warming etc. In the second part the students will choose a case among a limited number of case studies from a biological production system according to their interests. An expert in the area will act as a client requesting a LCA, while the student will act as LCA experts carrying out the assessment. This will be done in study groups, but the students will each write an individual report. This case will serve to illustrate some of the practical problems with LCA in more detail and train the use of LCA software. In addition, lectures given by specialists of relevant fields, real life LCA application will be illustrated | |||||||||||||||
| Learning Outcome | |||||||||||||||
| The objective of the course is to learn the theory behind, and to gain experience with applying life cycle assessment to biological production systems. The course will teach the students the basic principles for conducting an LCA and to evaluate environmental impacts of biological production. Upon completion of the course the students should be able to: Knowledge: - Identify major environmental impacts of biological production systems - Show overview of the theory of life cycle assessment (LCA) - outline the definition of scope, goal, inventory analysis and impact assessment - Describe how LCA can be used for improving production systems - Reflect about pros and cons of LCA software. - Summarize the transfer of LCA results to economic cost-benefit analysis (CBA) - Describe alternative environmental assessment tools and their applicability Skills: - Use LCA software and apply it to practical cases - Apply LCA on different kinds of products of biological production systems - Analyse factors that influence the environmental impact of biological systems directly or indirectly - Assess the conclusions in LCA-reports Competences: - Discuss environmental problems associated with biological production systems - Present an understanding of potential consequences of the results of an LCA - Suggest improvements to biological production systems in terms of environmental impact with the aid of LCA - Link LCA-outcomes with the CBA of economists and discuss the implications of this. | |||||||||||||||
| Course Literature | |||||||||||||||
| Course material will be announced at the beginning of the course and papers and print outs will be distributed during the course. For preparation the students may start with: - Henrikke Baumann and Anne-Marie Tillman: The hitch hiker's guide to LCA. Studentlitteratur, Lund, Sweden | |||||||||||||||
| Course Coordinator | |||||||||||||||
| Sander Bruun, sab@life.ku.dk, Department of Agriculture and Ecology/Plant and Soil Science, Phone: 353-33481 Dvora-Laio Wulfsohn, dw@life.ku.dk, Department of Agriculture and Ecology/Crop Science, Phone: 353-33395 Bo Jellesmark Thorsen, bjt@life.ku.dk, Forest & Landscape Denmark/Unit of Forestry, Phone: 353-31700 | |||||||||||||||
| Course Fee | |||||||||||||||
| None | |||||||||||||||
| Study Board | |||||||||||||||
| Study Committee NSN | |||||||||||||||
| Work Load | |||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||