59689 - Decarbonizing Materials and Machining Sourcing for the Energy Sector Through Life Cycle Assessment 

Nowadays the Energy Industry and Industrial Power Plants are committed to support sustainable development balancing environmental, social and economic benefits. To reach this goal, Turbomachinery products, in particularly gas turbines, require overcoming barriers imposed by performance, life and costs requirements. Here a new approach based on Life Cycle Assessment is proposed to define how carbon footprint and cost are correlated for different types of materials and manufacturing processes performed in different regions. The approach constitutes a decision-making tool through which the eco-designer can assess economic benefit of a sustainable product from a value creation point of view. It may also be used by public administration to define environmental tax strategies and promote incentives to mitigate environmental issues. It has been applied to an industrial gas turbine and validated for gas turbine casings comparing eco-friendly and low-cost country sourcing, evaluating how product value decreases if carbon footprint reduction does not create economic value. It was found that carbon footprint reduction for compressor casing is 22% by adopting an environmentally friendly source against cost increase by 26%. LCA analysis also provides environmental characterization of materials, manufacturing, machining and coating processes applicable to a generic industrial product. The findings allow comparing conceptual design alternatives according to Design for the Environment principles.