Life cycle assessment as a tool for controlling the development of technical activities:: application to the remediation of a site contaminated by sulfur

The objective of this study is to show how a life cycle assessment approach can be used to direct the development of technical activities according to environmental considerations. The case study deals with the remediation of a soil contaminated by sulfur in an industrial context. The environmental merits of four treatment techniques are compared by taking into account the raw materials and energy consumption, air and water emissions and waste production. First results are discussed criterion by criterion. It is shown that bio-leaching is the most energy-consuming technique, whereas liming requires the highest quantity of materials. Furthermore, results related to atmospheric emissions highlight the importance of transportation operations in the environmental balance especially in the case of offsite landfilling. As regards waste production, treatment techniques may be divided into two groups: on the one hand, liming and onsite containment which lead to great quantities stored onsite, on the other hand, offsite landfilling and bio-leaching for which waste is transported out of the site. Then, a multicriteria analysis enables to aggregate inventory results, avoiding compensation phenomena. Based on this analysis, onsite containment appears to be the most environmentally-friendly technique, whereas bio-leaching and offsite landfilling result in the most important environmental burdens. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.