A life cycle assessment of environmental performances of two combustion- and gasification-based waste-to-energy technologies

•The attributional LCA focuses on two specific combustion and gasification WtE units.•The assessed life cycle environmental impacts indicate sustainable environmental performances of both the technologies.•The combustion unit shows better environmental performances for almost all the impact categories.•The combustion unit can further improve its performances by treating bottom ashes in an up-to-date recovery process.•The gasification unit could strongly reduce the “Global Warming” impact by using a biomass coke.

An attributional life cycle analysis (LCA) was developed to compare the environmental performances of two waste-to-energy (WtE) units, which utilize the predominant technologies among those available for combustion and gasification processes: a moving grate combustor and a vertical shaft gasifier coupled with direct melting. The two units were assumed to be fed with the same unsorted residual municipal waste, having a composition estimated as a European average. Data from several plants in operation were processed by means of mass and energy balances, and on the basis of the flows and stocks of materials and elements inside and throughout the two units, as provided by a specific substance flow analysis. The potential life cycle environmental impacts related to the operations of the two WtE units were estimated by means of the Impact 2002+ methodology. They indicate that both the technologies have sustainable environmental performances, but those of the moving grate combustion unit are better for most of the selected impact categories. The analysis of the contributions from all the stages of each specific technology suggests where improvements in technological solutions and management criteria should be focused to obtain further and remarkable environmental improvements.