Life cycle assessment and life cycle costing of sanitary ware manufacturing: A case study in China

Lyu, Jingxiang, Gu, Fu, Zhang, Wujie and Guo, Jianfeng 2019. Life cycle assessment and life cycle costing of sanitary ware manufacturing: A case study in China. Journal of Cleaner Production 238 , 117938. 10.1016/j.jclepro.2019.117938

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Abstract

Sanitary ware industry consumes vast amounts of energy and materials; however, little is known about the environmental impacts and economic costs associated with the production of sanitary ware. Selecting a factory of a leading Chinese sanitary ware company, Huida Co. Ltd., this paper employs a combined “cradle-to-gate” life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle costing (LCC) methodology to evaluate the environmental impacts and economic costs related to the production of one tonne of sanitary ware. The LCA results indicate firing and drying are the processes with the greatest environmental impacts, attributing to the combustion of coke oven gas. The LCC results show that casting, body preparation and firing are the greatest contributors to the total equipment, material and energy costs, respectively. The results of sensitivity analysis confirm that increasing fuel efficiency, natural gas usage and recycling rates can reduce the overall environmental impacts, but the total costs would be increased by 13.8% if coke oven gas is fully replaced by natural gas, even considering carbon tax. Based on the findings, recommendations such as using green materials and improving energy efficiency, are provided to promote both the environmental and economic sustainability of sanitary ware production.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Engineering
Publisher:	Elsevier
ISSN:	0959-6526
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	21 October 2019
Date of Acceptance:	5 August 2019
Last Modified:	06 Nov 2024 19:15
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125979

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