Fuels are part of virtually every product life cycle, for example through process energy, in machinery, or for transport services. The supply of fuels can be associated with a wide range of environmental problems and social issues.
Jan 30th, 2024
Many types of fuel are important commodities traded globally. Reliable data on the extraction, production, and distribution of fuels from primary energy resources (of fossil, nuclear, or renewable origin) is therefore crucial for most LCA studies, but very challenging to gather case-by-case.
The ecoinvent database contains supply chain information for most common fuel types. The data typically represents country-averages of (mainly conventional) extraction and processing technologies in important producing regions, as well as the transportation of crude or refined fuels via multiple modes of transport. Fossil fuels encompass hard coal, lignite, crude petroleum (oil), and refined petroleum products, natural gas, and peat. Renewable fuels derived from biomass are commonly referred to as biofuels. The ecoinvent database contains information on gaseous (biogas/biomethane), liquid (bioethanol, biodiesel or vegetable oil methyl ester), and solid biofuels (energy wood products) from various biomass feedstocks. Data is also available on the supply chains for uranium, a nuclear fuel.
Coal
Coal is a fossil resource formed from pre-historic vegetation sediments which were transformed under high pressure and elevated temperature to a combustible brownish to black sedimentary rock. Coal deposits can be found on all continents; however, the abundance and quality of coal differs largely between regions.
Since the inception of the industrial revolution, coal still plays a major role in the world’s energy production. Due to its relatively low price and abundance, coal forms an economic alternative to petroleum oil, natural gas, and renewables, however also being the fossil fuel with the highest emissions per produced power. According to IEA, coal is still the second most important primary energy carrier, and at the same time the largest anthropogenic source of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere. Wastewater from coal mining can be acidic and contain various pollutants which can leak into the environment.
The largest coal reserves are currently located in Australia, China, India, Russia, and the United States. Apart from these countries Colombia, Indonesia, and South Africa are the most important coal producers today.
Sector Overview
The coal sector in the ecoinvent database is comprised of mining and preparation of hard coal and lignite (also known as brown coal). No further quality distinctions/classifications, e.g. by heating value, or by application (steam coal vs. coking coal) are currently made in the ecoinvent database. Both coal types are also processed into briquettes used for heat production, while the original/crude form is used as inputs in many datasets for electricity and heat production. See the Energy sector for more information.
Sector Highlights
Hard Coal
Production of hard coal is split into regions such as: Australia, China, Europe, Indonesia, India, Russia, South Africa, North and South America. For India and South Africa, the mining and preparation is modelled in as separate activities, while for the other regions these steps are contained in a single dataset. In South Africa, the mine operation and preparation steps are differentiated further. Mining is disaggregated into three types: open cast mining, dragline or truck, and shovel and underground mining, coal preparation as “coal washing” and “crushing and destoning”.
The mining process itself is highly energy intensive and requires heavy machinery. In some cases, energy demand at mines is met with on-site power plants. These are fired with raw coal, which is high in impurities and thus results in a combustion process low in efficiency and high in emissions, represented in the ecoinvent activity “electricity production, hard coal, at coal mine power plant”.
After mining and preparation, the global trade of hard coal is represented in the ecoinvent database in the form of import datasets connecting the larger world regions, the mentioned production regions, and distribution of hard coal over the globe.
Lignite
Lignite production is represented in datasets combining open cast mining and preparation in Europe and India. Lignite is subsequently used for heat and electricity production in many countries. Alternatively, it can be processed into lignite briquettes. This enables easier transport and the briquettes are often used in industrial furnaces.
The lignite mining datasets include the recultivation of the land after the occupation, energy and water use, as well as emissions and spoils of the process.
Data Providers
Data on the coal sector is based on contributions from different data providers, including (but not limited to):
- Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI), Switzerland
- Confederation of Indian Industry, India
- The Green House Company, South Africa
Editors
- Philippa Notten (Main Editor), The Green House Company, South Africa
- Christian Bauer (Co-Editor), Paul Scherer Institut, Switzerland
- Emilia Moreno Ruiz (Co-Editor), ecoinvent Association, Switzerland
- Jürgen Reinhard (Co-Editor), Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (EMPA), Switzerland
Relevant Sources
While the database contains all needed information to understand the modelling and calculations behind its contents, the reports below provide further information for enhanced understanding of the activities within the sector.
Tiwary, R. K., (2001). Environmental Impact of Coal Mining on Water Regime and Its Management. Water, Air, & Soil Pollution. 132: 185–99.
Natural Gas
Natural gas has evolved from being considered a by-product in the early days of oil extraction to a valuable commodity. Recent events, especially in Europe, have highlighted and amplified the geopolitical importance of natural gas supply. Today natural gas is traded all over the world and transported through pipelines as pressurized gas or with ships in the form of liquefied natural gas (LNG).
Natural gas consists primarily of methane. Depending on origin, it also includes varying amounts of ethane, propane, or butane and traces of carbon monoxide/dioxide, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides. The release of methane into the atmosphere, both from human activities and natural processes, has gained much attention in recent years due to its contribution to global warming. As a result, the oil and gas industry has come under increasing scrutiny as a major anthropogenic source of these emissions. Natural gas is frequently put forward as a less carbon-intensive alternative to coal and oil, e.g., for electricity generation. However, as a fossil energy carrier and potent greenhouse gas, the supply and combustion of natural gas can still lead to high impacts on the environment.
Sector Overview
The data on extraction of crude petroleum oil and natural gas in the ecoinvent database was completely revised within a sector overhaul for the release of version 3.9. in 2022. Introduced with this update, the production of petroleum and natural gas is consistently modelled as average combined (i.e., associated) from offshore and onshore operations in each country of production. With the reference year of 2021, the subsequent update for version 3.10 in 2023 increased the total number of production countries in the ecoinvent database to 41:
- petroleum and gas production, offshore: AE, AR, AU, AZ, BR, CA, CN, CO, DE, EC, EG, GB, ID, IN, IR, IT, KW, KZ, LY, MX, MY, NG, NL, NO, PE, PL, QA, RO, RU, SA, TH, TM, TR, TT, US, VE (36 geographies)
- petroleum and gas production, onshore: AE, AR, AU, AZ, BO, BR, CA, CN, CO, DE, DZ, EC, EG, GB, ID, IN, IQ, IR, IT, KW, KZ, LY, MX, MY, NG, NL, OM, PE, PL, QA, RO, RU, SA, TH, TM, TR, TT, US, UZ, VE (40 geographies)
Infrastructure for extraction processes is represented in separate datasets. Additionally, datasets on the construction and transport of natural gas through pipelines for high- and low-pressure distribution networks are modelled. For the transport of natural gas in the form of liquefied natural gas (LNG), the ecoinvent database contains processes for the liquefaction and evaporation of natural gas. The update for 3.9 introduces a change to the reference conditions for natural gas products (except natural gas liquids): these products are now measured in standard cubic meters (Sm3), which is defined as the volume the gas takes up at 15°C (288.15°K) and atmospheric pressure (1.013 bar).
Sector Highlights
Natural Gas Supply
With the update for 3.10 in 2023, the latest global annual statistics available were applied to reflect the global supply situation in 2021. The geographical coverage of production was expanded to a total of 41 countries around the world. When combined, the ecoinvent database now covers more than 96% of the global production of crude petroleum oil and in excess of 98% of natural gas. Key features of the update are data on the flaring of natural gas from the Global Gas Flaring Reduction Partnership (GGFR) of the World Bank and on methane emissions from gas venting and fugitive emission sources from the International Energy Agency’s Global Methane Tracker 2022. In addition, new or updated natural gas supplies (at high pressure) are provided for 57 countries, representing 93% of global gas consumption, based on the situation in 2021. Consumption mixes for local distribution of natural gas (i.e., at low pressure) are introduced for fifteen countries in Asia (China, Japan, and South Korea), Europe (Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, and the United Kingdom), and North America (Canada, Mexico, and the USA) with version 3.10.
Natural gas at different pressures: low pressure (<0.1 bar overpressure), medium pressure (>0.1 bar, < 1 bar) and high pressure (>1bar) is alsThe supply of natural gas in 2021 was modelled for EU-27 countries, Norway, and Turkey based on statistics on imports by trade partner from EuroStat. The supply situation in the United Kingdom was derived from the ‘Digest of UK Energy Statistics (DUKES), and on bp’s ‘Statistical Review of World Energy’ from June 2022’ for the rest of the world. Imports to Rest-of-Europe (RoE) and the Rest-of-the-World (RoW) geographies were calculated by subtracting the sum of country-specific supply modelled separately from the total import of the respective regions.
Liquefied Natural Gas
Datasets for the compression and evaporation of liquefied natural gas (LNG) are represented as “natural gas production, liquefied” and origin-specific activities for import and evaporation of liquefied natural gas at the place of demand. The update for version 3.10 expanded the number of LNG-exporting countries in the database to fourteen (AE, AU, DZ, EG, ID, MY, NG, NO, OM, PE, QA, RU, TT, and the US). LNG transport is modelled in a single dedicated transport dataset “transport, freight, sea, tanker for liquefied natural gas”, established for version 3.6 in 2019 (within the LCI component of the SRI program).
Natural Gas, Vehicle Grade
Natural gas at different pressures: low pressure (<0.1 bar overpressure), medium pressure (>0.1 bar, < 1 bar) and high pressure (>1bar) is also provided in “vehicle grade” form. These datasets include emissions, losses as well as energy and infrastructure required to supply natural gas for vehicles.
Burning of Natural Gas
Natural gas is integrated extensively across various sectors of the ecoinvent database. The sectors include i.a. energy and heat production, the production of chemicals, building materials, and metals. Specific combustion activities, including the burning of natural gas in gas turbines, polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells, and solid oxide fuel cells are also available.
Data Providers
Data in the natural gas sector is based on contributions from different data providers. These include, but are not limited to:
- ESU-services, Switzerland
- International Reference Center for Life Cycle of Products and Sustainable Transition (CIRAIG), Canada
- Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI), Switzerland
- Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (IFEU), Germany
- ACV Brazil, Brazil
Editors
- Eric Johnson (Main Editor), Atlantic Consulting, Switzerland
- Carl Vadenbo (Co-Editor), ecoinvent Association, Switzerland
Relevant Sources
While the database contains all needed information to understand the modelling and calculations behind its contents, the reports below provide further information for enhanced understanding of the activities within the sector.
Bussa, M., Jungbluth, N., Meili, C., (2023). Life cycle inventories for long-distance transport and distribution of natural gas. Schaffhausen, CH: ESU-services Ltd. Available from: http://esu-services.ch/data/public-lci-reports/
Faist Emmenegger, M., Del Duce, A., Moreno Ruiz, E., Brunner, F., (2017). Update of the European natural gas supply chains. Zurich, CH: ecoinvent Association.
Faist Emmenegger, M., Heck, T., Jungbluth, N., Tuchschmid, M., (2007). Erdgas. In: Dones, R. (Ed.) et al., Sachbilanzen von Energiesystemen: Grundlagen für den ökologischen Vergleich von Energiesystemen und den Einbezug von Energiesystemen in Ökobilanzen für die Schweiz.
Meili, C., Jungbluth, N., Bussa , M., (2023). Life cycle inventories of crude oil and natural gas extraction. Schaffhausen, CH: ESU-services Ltd. Available from: http://esu-services.ch/data/public-lci-reports/
Notten, P.J., Althaus, H-J., Burke, M., Läderach, A., (2018). Life cycle inventories of global shipping – Global. Zurich, CH: ecoinvent Association.
Valebona, F., Rocha, T.B., Motta, F.L., (2020). Cornerstone Project. Recontextualization of Datasets: Methodology. Curitiba, BR: ACV Brazil.
Petroleum
Petroleum (also referred to as crude oil or just crude) has established itself as one of the most important global commodities over the last century. The applications of products that can be refined from petroleum are omnipresent. Some are obvious, such as gasoline and diesel fuels for transportation, machinery, or stationary installations. The full product slate of the refinery finds uses in a vast range of applications, from road surfaces to petrochemicals. Hence, petroleum products can be encountered, in one form or another, in the life cycles of virtually any product system.
Sector Overview
The ecoinvent database includes data on the extraction, transport, and refining of crude petroleum oil to liquid and gaseous fuels, as well as other refined petroleum products. An extensive overhaul of the sector for version 3.9 and then further expended for the release of version 3.10 of the database in 2023 increased the data coverage of the production to 41 countries. Taken together, these countries represented approximately 96% of the global production of petroleum and over 98% of natural gas output in 2021. All country-specific extraction datasets have been created using a common approach, relying extensively on global data sources to ensure a high degree of consistency between the geographies covered. The production of crude petroleum oil and natural gas is modelled as the average combined (i.e., associated) production of oil and gas, only distinguishing between offshore and onshore operations, for each country.
- petroleum and gas production, offshore: AE, AR, AU, AZ, BR, CA, CN, CO, DE, EC, EG, GB, ID, IN, IR, IT, KW, KZ, LY, MX, MY, NG, NL, NO, PE, PL, QA, RO, RU, SA, TH, TM, TR, TT, US, VE (36 geographies)
- petroleum and gas production, onshore: AE, AR, AU, AZ, BO, BR, CA, CN, CO, DE, DZ, EC, EG, GB, ID, IN, IQ, IR, IT, KW, KZ, LY, MX, MY, NG, NL, OM, PE, PL, QA, RO, RU, SA, TH, TM, TR, TT, US, UZ, VE (40 geographies)
The update for version 3.10 included regionalized consumption mixes of crude petroleum oil in Brazil (BR), Colombia (CO), India (IN), Peru (PE), and South Africa (ZA), in addition to updating supply to Switzerland (CH), Europe without Switzerland, and the Region of North America (RNA). This reflects the petroleum supply situation in these regions and globally in 2021. In addition, a country-specific input to petroleum refinery operations in Brazil had already been established within the Cornerstone project for the release of version 3.8 in 2021. The data on petroleum refinery operation were updated (except for CH), alongside new data on synthetic fuel production from coal liquefaction in South Africa, within the LCI component of the SRI programme for ecoinvent version 3.6 in 2019.
- petroleum refinery operations: BR, CH, CO, Europe without Switzerland, GLO, IN, PE, ZA
- synthetic fuel production, from coal, high temperature Fisher-Tropsch operations: ZA
Quality and Classification of Crude Petroleum Oil
Crude petroleum extracted from different subterranean reservoirs (oil fields) around the world shows large variations in terms quality. Among the most important physio-chemical properties commonly used to classify crude oils are sulfur content and the American Petroleum Institute gravity (API gravity). API gravity is the inverse of a petroleum liquid’s density relative to that of water scaled to degrees API, and it can be used to compare the densities of different oil types. The exact definitions of crude oil classes differ between sources and countries, e.g., Jing et al. (2020) use the following ranges for classification: As indicated in Table 1, API gravity (as light: API >32°; medium: 22° < API ≤ 32°, or; heavy: API ≤ 22°) and sulfur (S) content (as sweet: ≤ 0.5 wt% S, or; and sour: > 0.5 wt% S). The term ‘extra-heavy crude oil’ is sometimes used for oils with an API gravity less than 10°, but with lower viscosity than natural bitumen (USGS, 2006).
| Type | Description | API gravity (°) | Sulfur content |
| Light |
|
>32 | ≤ 0.5, Sweet Light |
| > 0.5, Sour Light | |||
| Medium |
|
22-32 | ≤ 0.5, Sweet Medium |
| > 0.5, Sour Medium | |||
| Heavy |
|
<22 | ≤ 0.5, Sweet Heavy |
| > 0.5, Sour Heavy |
Table 1– Crude petroleum oil classification based on API gravity and description according to Jing et al. (2020; Supplementary Table 4).
Long Distance Transport
For the regional and global movements of crude petroleum oil, data on transport via onshore and offshore pipelines, barge tankers, lorries as well as transoceanic tankers are available.
Global Trade
The data in the ecoinvent database currently neither distinguish between different crude oil qualities nor represent international trade flows and regional supply mixes. The global average supply mix of petroleum supplies by default all petroleum-demanding activities (unless otherwise specified in the datasets).
Region-specific supply mixes for Switzerland (CH), Europe without Switzerland, and the Region of North America (RNA) were introduced with version 3.9 of the ecoinvent database. Prior to that, regionalized petroleum supply was only modelled for refinery operations in Brazil (established within the Cornerstone project for the release of version 3.8 in 2021). Although petroleum qualities are not reflected in the database, the modelling of petroleum refinery operations accounts for the quality characteristics of the typical input mix supplied to refineries in the respective region. Read “Petroleum Refining” for more details.
The ability to consider the influence of petroleum quality on refinery product yields and resource requirements constitutes a major improvement compared to previous versions.
Petroleum Refining
The refining of crude petroleum oil to liquid and gaseous fuels, as well as other petroleum products, involves a complex network of interlinked and interdependent processes. To reflect this complexity, the update of version 3.6 of the ecoinvent database in 2019 applied/included an advanced refinery model developed by scientists and industry experts at the Institut für Energie- und Umweltforschung (ifeu), Heidelberg.
Product Applications
The petroleum products yielded in refineries are used in a wide range of applications across numerous industrial sectors. Among other prominent examples, the ecoinvent database includes data on the generation of heat and electricity, the transport of goods and people by aircraft, ships, lorries, cars, and other means, agricultural and construction equipment, and the production of petroleum-based chemicals, which in turn are used in many other processes.
Data Providers
-
Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (IFEU), Germany
-
Environmental and Process System Engineering (E&PSE) research group at the University of Cape Town, South Africa
-
ACV Brazil, Brazil
- ESU-services Ltd., Switzerland
Editors
- Eric Johnson (Main Editor), Atlantic Consulting, Switzerland
- Christian Bauer (Co-Editor), Paul Scherrer Institut, Switzerland
- Carl Vadenbo (Co-Editor), ecoinvent Association, Switzerland
Relevant Sources
Fehrenbach, H., Liebich, A., Abdalla, N., Biemann, K., Fröhlich, T., Simon, B., (2018). Life Cycle Inventories of Petroleum Refinery Operation. Zurich, Switzerland: ecoinvent Association. Accessible at SRI project results (registration required).
Jing, Liang, et al., (2020). Carbon intensity of global crude oil refining and mitigation potential. Nature Climate Change 10.6: 526-532.
Jungbluth, N., (2007). Erdöl, in Dones R., Sachbilanzen von Energiesystemen. Final report No. 6 ecoinvent data v2.0, 6. Dübendorf and Villigen, CH: Swiss Centre for LCI, PSI.
Accessible in the Reports section of version 2. of the ecoinvent database.
Meili, C., Jungbluth, N., Bussa, M., (2023a). Life cycle inventories of crude oil and natural gas extraction. Schaffhausen, CH: ESU-services Ltd. Available from: http://esu-services.ch/data/public-lci-reports/
Meili, C., Jungbluth, N., Bussa, M., (2023b). Life cycle inventories of long-distance transport of crude oil. Schaffhausen, CH: ESU-services Ltd. Available from: http://esu-services.ch/data/public-lci-reports/
Russo, V., von Blottnitz, H., (2018). Life Cycle Inventories of synthetic fuel production from coal and domestic fuel markets in South Africa. Zurich, CH: ecoinvent Association. Accessible at SRI project results (registration required).
Valebona, F., Rocha, T.B., Motta, F.L., (2020). Cornerstone Project. Recontextualization of Datasets: Methodology. Curitiba, BR: ACV Brazil.