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Sustainability Implications of the Incorporation of a Biogas Trapping System into a Conventional Crude Palm Oil Supply Chain

Author

Listed:
  • Chye Ing Lim

    (Faculty of Engineering and Science, Curtin University Malaysia, Sarawak 98009, Malaysia
    These authors contributed equally to this work.)

  • Wahidul K. Biswas

    (Sustainable Engineering Group, Curtin University, Perth, WA 6845, Australia
    These authors contributed equally to this work.)

Abstract

This paper presents the sustainability implications of installing biogas trapping systems in palm oil mills of a crude palm oil production supply chains in Malaysia. The study evaluates the impact of this mitigation strategy on the existing supply chains published by Lim and Biswas. The experience of a local palm oil mill installed with the KUBOTA biogas trapping system was incorporated into a typical 60 metric tonne per hour palm oil mill for effluent treatment. This allowed us to assess the changes in sustainability performance of the whole crude palm oil supply chain using the Palm Oil Sustainability Assessment (POSA) framework. Installing the biogas trapping system increased waste recycling and reuse percentage of the mill from 81.81% to 99.99% and the energy ratio (energy output/fossil fuel and biomass energy input) from 2.45 to 2.56; and reduced the Greenhouse Gas emission of the supply chain from 0.814 tonne CO 2 eq to 0.196 tonne CO 2 eq per tonne of Crude Palm Oil. This system could also potentially increase the mill’s annual revenue by 2.3%, while sacrificing the sustainability performance of other economic indicators (i.e., a further 3% negative deviation of actual growth rate from sustainable growth rate). Overall, sustainability score of the supply chain improved from 3.47/5 to 3.59/5 on the 5-level-Likert-scale due to environmental improvement strategy consideration. Finally, this paper shows that the POSA framework is capable of capturing changes in the sustainability performance of triple bottom line indicators associated with the use or incorporation of any improvement strategy in the crude palm oil supply chain.

Suggested Citation

  • Chye Ing Lim & Wahidul K. Biswas, 2019. "Sustainability Implications of the Incorporation of a Biogas Trapping System into a Conventional Crude Palm Oil Supply Chain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(3), pages 1-19, February.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:3:p:792-:d:203135
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Foo, K.Y. & Hameed, B.H., 2010. "Insight into the applications of palm oil mill effluent: A renewable utilization of the industrial agricultural waste," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 14(5), pages 1445-1452, June.
    2. Lalit Arora & Shailendra Kumar & Piyush Verma, 2018. "The Anatomy of Sustainable Growth Rate of Indian Manufacturing Firms," Global Business Review, International Management Institute, vol. 19(4), pages 1050-1071, August.
    3. Chye Ing Lim & Wahidul Biswas, 2015. "An Evaluation of Holistic Sustainability Assessment Framework for Palm Oil Production in Malaysia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(12), pages 1-27, December.
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    Cited by:

    1. How, Bing Shen & Ngan, Sue Lin & Hong, Boon Hooi & Lam, Hon Loong & Ng, Wendy Pei Qin & Yusup, Suzana & Ghani, Wan Azlina Wan Abd Karim & Kansha, Yasuki & Chan, Yi Herng & Cheah, Kin Wai & Shahbaz, Mu, 2019. "An outlook of Malaysian biomass industry commercialisation: Perspectives and challenges," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 1-1.
    2. Muhammad Ansori Nasution & Ayu Wulandari & Tofael Ahamed & Ryozo Noguchi, 2020. "Alternative POME Treatment Technology in the Implementation of Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO), and Malaysian Sustainable Palm Oil (MSPO) Standards Using LCA," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(10), pages 1-16, May.
    3. Vivek Arulnathan & Mohammad Davoud Heidari & Maurice Doyon & Eric P. H. Li & Nathan Pelletier, 2022. "Economic Indicators for Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment: Going beyond Life Cycle Costing," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(1), pages 1-27, December.
    4. Tan, Yue Dian & Lim, Jeng Shiun & Wan Alwi, Sharifah Rafidah, 2020. "Multi-objective optimal design for integrated palm oil mill complex with consideration of effluent elimination," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 202(C).
    5. Nirvana Angela Marting Vidaurre & Ricardo Vargas-Carpintero & Moritz Wagner & Jan Lask & Iris Lewandowski, 2020. "Social Aspects in the Assessment of Biobased Value Chains," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(23), pages 1-27, November.

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