Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of oyster farming in Washington State
Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2017-06 Oysters are a culturally and economically valuable source of food and often promoted as an environmentally sustainable food choice. Life-cycle assessment (LCA) provides a standardized means of assessing the environmental costs of a product bu...
Main Author: | |
---|---|
Other Authors: | |
Format: | Thesis |
Language: | English |
Published: |
2017
|
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1773/40230 |
id |
ftunivwashington:oai:digital.lib.washington.edu:1773/40230 |
---|---|
record_format |
openpolar |
spelling |
ftunivwashington:oai:digital.lib.washington.edu:1773/40230 2023-05-15T15:58:55+02:00 Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of oyster farming in Washington State Pucylowski, Teressa Allison, Edward H 2017-06 application/pdf http://hdl.handle.net/1773/40230 en_US eng Pucylowski_washington_0250O_17561.pdf http://hdl.handle.net/1773/40230 none aquaculture environmental impacts life cycle assessment oyster sustainability Environmental studies Marine affairs Thesis 2017 ftunivwashington 2023-03-12T18:57:48Z Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2017-06 Oysters are a culturally and economically valuable source of food and often promoted as an environmentally sustainable food choice. Life-cycle assessment (LCA) provides a standardized means of assessing the environmental costs of a product but has not previously been applied to oyster production. This thesis develops and applies an LCA for a production system in the Pacific North West (PNW), where oyster farming represents a major part of aquaculture production. Contemporary PNW oyster production typically consists of a hatchery, Floating Upweller System (FLUPSY), grow-out, and processing subsystems. LCA was used to quantify a suite of global scale resource depletion and environmental impacts of single-seed oyster aquaculture (individually grown instead of cultched), from cradle to retail-gate, using five different impacts categories: global warming potential (GWP), ozone depletion potential (ODP), marine eutrophication potential (MEP), human toxicity potential (HTP), and cumulative energy demand (CED). Two varieties of Pacific oysters (Crassostrea gigas) were analyzed using a functional unit (FU) of one dozen live oysters on the half shell: beach-grown oysters (trade name Classic Pacifics) and tide-tumbled oysters (trade name Shigokus). Results show electricity and fuel as the dominant contributors to impacts, with infrastructure, water use, and chemicals as minimal contributors. The contribution of each subsystem to total resource demand varied with each impact category. Production of Shigokus had slightly higher impacts overall, due to higher material use during the grow-out phase compared to Classic Pacifics, even though they have a higher survival rate. As a non-intensive and non-fed system, oyster aquaculture overall had low values per each impact category, confirming claims that they are a low environmental impact food choice. Thesis Crassostrea gigas University of Washington, Seattle: ResearchWorks Pacific |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
University of Washington, Seattle: ResearchWorks |
op_collection_id |
ftunivwashington |
language |
English |
topic |
aquaculture environmental impacts life cycle assessment oyster sustainability Environmental studies Marine affairs |
spellingShingle |
aquaculture environmental impacts life cycle assessment oyster sustainability Environmental studies Marine affairs Pucylowski, Teressa Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of oyster farming in Washington State |
topic_facet |
aquaculture environmental impacts life cycle assessment oyster sustainability Environmental studies Marine affairs |
description |
Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2017-06 Oysters are a culturally and economically valuable source of food and often promoted as an environmentally sustainable food choice. Life-cycle assessment (LCA) provides a standardized means of assessing the environmental costs of a product but has not previously been applied to oyster production. This thesis develops and applies an LCA for a production system in the Pacific North West (PNW), where oyster farming represents a major part of aquaculture production. Contemporary PNW oyster production typically consists of a hatchery, Floating Upweller System (FLUPSY), grow-out, and processing subsystems. LCA was used to quantify a suite of global scale resource depletion and environmental impacts of single-seed oyster aquaculture (individually grown instead of cultched), from cradle to retail-gate, using five different impacts categories: global warming potential (GWP), ozone depletion potential (ODP), marine eutrophication potential (MEP), human toxicity potential (HTP), and cumulative energy demand (CED). Two varieties of Pacific oysters (Crassostrea gigas) were analyzed using a functional unit (FU) of one dozen live oysters on the half shell: beach-grown oysters (trade name Classic Pacifics) and tide-tumbled oysters (trade name Shigokus). Results show electricity and fuel as the dominant contributors to impacts, with infrastructure, water use, and chemicals as minimal contributors. The contribution of each subsystem to total resource demand varied with each impact category. Production of Shigokus had slightly higher impacts overall, due to higher material use during the grow-out phase compared to Classic Pacifics, even though they have a higher survival rate. As a non-intensive and non-fed system, oyster aquaculture overall had low values per each impact category, confirming claims that they are a low environmental impact food choice. |
author2 |
Allison, Edward H |
format |
Thesis |
author |
Pucylowski, Teressa |
author_facet |
Pucylowski, Teressa |
author_sort |
Pucylowski, Teressa |
title |
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of oyster farming in Washington State |
title_short |
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of oyster farming in Washington State |
title_full |
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of oyster farming in Washington State |
title_fullStr |
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of oyster farming in Washington State |
title_full_unstemmed |
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of oyster farming in Washington State |
title_sort |
life cycle assessment (lca) of oyster farming in washington state |
publishDate |
2017 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/1773/40230 |
geographic |
Pacific |
geographic_facet |
Pacific |
genre |
Crassostrea gigas |
genre_facet |
Crassostrea gigas |
op_relation |
Pucylowski_washington_0250O_17561.pdf http://hdl.handle.net/1773/40230 |
op_rights |
none |
_version_ |
1766394696151597056 |