Life Cycle Assessment of a Mini Hydro Power Plant in Indonesia: A Case Study in Karai River

Indonesia is a vast archipelago with more than 10,000 islands spread across the nation. One of the cyhallenge to provide better lives for the residents is energy distribution to remote areas. With many rivers in the islands, hydropower plants become the best renewable energy source for these remote areas. This paper aims to assess the life cycle of a mini hydro power plant in Simalungun, Indonesia. Life cycle inventory data were collected and impacts were assessed using SimaPro software. A sensitivity analysis comparing two methods, CML-IA and TRACI 2.1 were conducted. Result shows that carcinogenic, marine aquatic eco-toxicity and freshwater aquatic eco-toxiticity are the highest environmental impact, generated from the construction of the mini hydropower plant.