Life cycle assessment of carbon capture, utilisation and storage technologies: An analytical review

Abstract

Abstract The impact of climate change is more evident now than ever due to the environmental burden accumulated over the past two decades. Decarbonising methods such as carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) technologies are the future of the green economy and are considered one of the most significant alternatives for mitigating carbon emissions. Therefore, this review mainly focuses on life cycle assessment (LCA), the current state-of-the-art tool to determine the environmental performance of the technologies. This paper aims to assess papers published from the year 2019 to 2022 from all around the world to understand the trend, challenges, and prospects of CCUS technologies in reducing carbon and environmental impacts. This review concludes that the employment of carbon capture technologies can significantly reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions but also increase other environmental burdens such as acidification, eutrophication and ecotoxicity depending on the type of carbon capture method used, energy penalty and the rate of oxides of nitrogen (NOx) emitted from the carbon capture infrastructure. Furthermore, Carbon Capture Utilisation (CCU) is a viable option to be employed in industries mainly to produce chemicals and use the captured carbon directly to combat GHG emissions with the proper modification of the carbon conversion method of the plant and the application of renewable energy. Although the Carbon Capture Storage (CCS) technology has an overall great impact on reducing Global Warming Potential (GWP), the increasing demand for fuel for the infrastructure causes environmental trade-offs with an increase in GHG emissions and other impact categories. The findings of this research would help in developing and implementing improvised methods and will provide a clear view of the prospects of CCUS technologies which will assist in decision-making.