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Review
. 2023 Feb 19:15:100254.
doi: 10.1016/j.ese.2023.100254. eCollection 2023 Jul.

Bioplastic production in terms of life cycle assessment: A state-of-the-art review

Sameh Samir Ali  1   2 , Esraa A Abdelkarim  1 , Tamer Elsamahy  1 , Rania Al-Tohamy  1 , Fanghua Li  3 , Michael Kornaros  4 , Antonio Zuorro  5 , Daochen Zhu  1 , Jianzhong Sun  1
Affiliations
Review

Bioplastic production in terms of life cycle assessment: A state-of-the-art review

Sameh Samir Ali et al. Environ Sci Ecotechnol. .

Abstract

The current transition to sustainability and the circular economy can be viewed as a socio-technical response to environmental impacts and the need to enhance the overall performance of the linear production and consumption paradigm. The concept of biowaste refineries as a feasible alternative to petroleum refineries has gained popularity. Biowaste has become an important raw material source for developing bioproducts and biofuels. Therefore, effective environmental biowaste management systems for the production of bioproducts and biofuels are crucial and can be employed as pillars of a circular economy. Bioplastics, typically plastics manufactured from bio-based polymers, stand to contribute to more sustainable commercial plastic life cycles as part of a circular economy in which virgin polymers are made from renewable or recycled raw materials. Various frameworks and strategies are utilized to model and illustrate additional patterns in fossil fuel and bioplastic feedstock prices for various governments' long-term policies. This review paper highlights the harmful impacts of fossil-based plastic on the environment and human health, as well as the mass need for eco-friendly alternatives such as biodegradable bioplastics. Utilizing new types of bioplastics derived from renewable resources (e.g., biowastes, agricultural wastes, or microalgae) and choosing the appropriate end-of-life option (e.g., anaerobic digestion) may be the right direction to ensure the sustainability of bioplastic production. Clear regulation and financial incentives are still required to scale from niche polymers to large-scale bioplastic market applications with a truly sustainable impact.

Keywords: Bioeconomy; Biofuel; Bioplastic; Biowaste; Life cycle assessment.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Image 1
Graphical abstract
Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Plastic value chain in life cycle assessment (LCA) and end-of-life (EoL).
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Circular plastic economy concept and bioplastic end-of-life.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Negative impact of fossil-based plastics on the environment (a) and human health (b).
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
a, Bioplastic production and forecast. b, Different types of biodegradable bioplastic. c, Non-biodegradable bioplastic production [[29], [30], [31]].
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
Polylactic acid (PLA), polybutylene succinate (PBS), cellulose acetate (CA), bio-based polyethylene terephthalate (Bio-PET), and bio-polyethylene (Bio-PE) production pathways from non-edible lignocellulosic biomass [64,72,79,83,106].
Fig. 6
Fig. 6
Life cycle assessment of polylactic acid, polybutylene succinate biopolymer, and cellulose acetate biopolymer.
Fig. 7
Fig. 7
General scheme of utilizing non-edible lignocellulosic biomass for starch-based polymer (SBP) production (a) and SBP life cycle assessment (b).
Fig. 8
Fig. 8
Life cycle assessment of bio-based polyethylene terephthalate (Bio-PET) and bio-polyethylene (Bio-PE).
Fig. 9
Fig. 9
a, Methodologies and software tools used in LCA analysis to improve and upgrade the bioplastics sector. b, The proposed framework of bioplastic economy as an alternative to conventional plastic to achieve sustainability [130].
Fig. 10
Fig. 10
Biogas production using the co-digestion process of biowaste and bioplastic wastes as a promising end-of-life option.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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