Agrifootprint 6.3, ReCiPe 2016 Midpoint (H), missing characterization factors

Question

Dear OpenLCA developers,

Background info: OpenLCA 2.0.3, Agrifootprint 6.3, ReCiPe 2016 Midpoint (H), LCIA v2.2.1.

Please, open any cultivation process describing DK crops (e.g. Barley grain, at farm {DK} Economic). In the outputs you will find an emission to air from Ammonia (regionalized for Denmark). This flow carries no characterization factor for neither “Fine particulate matter formation” nor “Terrestrial acidification”. Therefore the impacts on these impact categories are largely underestimated via the use of ReCiPe 2016 Midpoint (H).

I described the problem for DK crops, but in reality this is true for most of the EU countries (e.g. IT, FR, DE, NL, ...).

note: A simple fix could be assigning to all these "EU Ammonia flows" a characterization factor equal to the generic values used for RER. However, I have just discovered that this is NOT what SimaPro uses for AFP6 via ReCiPe 2016 Midpoint (H), so it does not seem appropriate / aligned to do so.

@OpenLCA developers, would you release an update for ReCiPe 2016 Midpoint (H)? ...or will you update the AFP6.3 database?

 

I look forward to hearing from you.

All the best,

Alberto

Comments

Im unsure why these are not properly characterized, as these characterization factors are available at the RIVM website (https://www.rivm.nl/documenten/recipe2016country-factorsv1120171221).
The existing characterization values of the included flows within the OpenLCAs Recipe 2016 (h) method match the ones from RIVM , while the documentation from the RIVM website includes all the other nations and characterization of their flows. Im guessing Simapro have already included those factors but id suggest checking as i dont have access to SImapro at this time.

For a temporary fix to practicioners, i suggest adding the missing flows into the PM and TE characterization factors if using Recipie 2016 with Agrifootprint. Your results of those impact categories will be way off if you dont include this, since some countries include the flow while others dont with approximately 100% increase in those impact categories if you dont include them.

This should be an easy fix by the developers, so im not sure why this critical additions have not been implemented. Please fix this soon dev team.

Answer 1

Hi Alberto,

thank you, we are anyhow now updating the method pack, with the new regionalisation and EF3.1 mapped etc. So far it is a bit a tragedy with LCIA methods since they are not really documented as they are implemented in software, although they of course contribute to the final results of a calculation, a lot. For us, a conclusion such as "let's just do it as (wrong) as SimaPro" is not too satisfying, but there are of course clear cases where something needs to be added / removed / changed in an LCIA method. And ReCiPe was somehow done with PRé/SimaPro involved, and while there are no official method updates tmk the method in SimaPro is updated somehow, although with not much documentation or explanation, and often even no version change, so here "let's do it as SimaPro" could be ok. Good point that you bring up and we will address this, thank you!

Andreas

Comments

Dear Andreas,
I can see that you have recently released the LCIA method package v2.3.2, but the issue described above for the missing characterization factors for the regionalized Ammonia flows in the case of “Terrestrial acidification” in ReCiPe 2016 Midpoint (H) is still present (you have only solved the “Fine particulate matter formation”).
In addition, I can also see that no characterization factor is associated to "Carbon dioxide, peat oxidation" for the IPCC 2021 method.
It would be good to fix these issues. Thanks.
All the best,
Alberto