SRISHTI MISHRA
MSc. (Previous) RMDA
DATE: 22/01/2021
ASSIGNMENT- BUILDING DESIGN STRATEGIES
TOPIC: LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT
QUESTION: Select any building material and execute its Life Cycle Assessment
indicating details during each stage of LCA and details of inventory for the material.
What is LCA?
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a technique for assessing the potential environmental
aspects and potential aspects associated with a product (or service), by:
compiling an inventory of relevant inputs and outputs,
evaluating the potential environmental impacts associated with those inputs and
outputs,
Interpreting the results of the inventory and impact phases in relation to the
objectives of the study.
LCA OF CERAMIC TILES
The ceramic products are widely used as building material.
The production of the ceramic tiles involves various processes from mining to end
product.
Ceramic tile is produced using completely natural resources such as clay, feldspar,
silica sand and dolomite.
1. CERAMIC MANUFACTURING PROCESS
The major processes of manufacturing the ceramic tiles are batching, mixing and
grinding, forming, firing and glazing.
After glazing, the ceramic products are checked for quality and packed.
(1) Batching: Weight batching and volume batching are the two different
methods followed universally. The weight batching is often used for precise
mixing and to produce good quality tiles. Before batching, batch calculations
are done considering the physical and chemical properties of the raw
materials.
(2) Mixing and Grinding: Once the proper batching is done all the raw materials
are mixed and sent to grinding ball mill. In grinding operation, these raw
materials are cracked down to further small particles for better forming
process. In grinding process, sufficient moisture is maintained hence, it is also
called as wet milling.
(3) Forming: The shape of tiles is formed by proper pressing by hydraulic
pressure. In this process, free-flowing powder with low moisture content is
allowed to flow from a hopper to forming die. In the die, the powder material
is compressed using hydraulic pressure up to 2500 tons. As the pressure is
applied the mixture is ejected from the bottom of the plunger as semi-solid
tile.
(4) Drying: The relative humidity of the tiles is maintained throughout the drying
process to avoid warping of tiles. The drying process takes a number of days
at a slow rate to avoid shrinkage cracks.
(5) Firing: To give strength and to avoid porosity in tiles, it is heated very
intensively in kilns. The most common kilns available for the manufacturing
of the ceramic tiles are electricity, gas and wood. After forming process, the
biscuit tiles are heated up to 1200 degree Celsius in the kiln and this process is
called biscuit firing. Generally, the biscuit firing process takes 2 to 3 days. In
case of the wet milling, roller kilns are used, here the firing is around 60
minutes with the temperature from 1150-1200 degree Celsius. After biscuit
firing, tiles are sent for glazing.
(6) Glazing: It is the process of providing an impervious layer over the ceramic
tiles. The mix for glazing is calculated and raw materials are batched. The
batched raw materials are mixed in a dry or wet mill. The milled glazing
materials are applied over the glost fired tiles, and it is fired again at 2050
degree Celsius for one hour in graphite furnace at 1 bar pressure. After firing,
the product has come out with good texture and smooth finish.
2. PRODUCTION PLANT
In general, there are two types of ceramic tiles production units, which are
medium and small plants.
In this, the raw material source of the medium plant is prepared in the plant itself,
but in the case of small plant unit, the raw material source is purchased.
Then, the small plant units give more impacts to the environment than the medium
plant units.
3. THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT OF MANUFACTURING
CERAMIC TILES
The major environmental impact of the ceramic tiles is air pollution, which leads to
several impacts on earth like, ozone layer depletion, global warming, acidification as well
as eutrophication.
1. EMISSION OF HAZARDOUS MATERIALS
In the manufacturing process, the ceramic tile emits various hazardous materials like
chemicals, gases and wastes that directly affect the environment and indirectly affect
the livelihood of human beings.
1. ENERGY CONSUMPTION
The manufacturing process of 1 m2 of the ceramic tile includes several processes in
which each process consume its own amount of energy and the by-product affects the
environment. From the inventory results, it is reported that these amount of inputs
have been used for manufacturing the ceramic tiles:
electricity (1.94 kWh/m2 ),
fuel oil (0.0095 1/m2 ),
natural gas (22.66 kWh/m2 ),
water (5.86 1/m2 ),
clay and sand (21.9 kg/m2 ),
temperature (550°c),
fuel gas (185371 Nm3 /h)
It is noted that the major consumption of energy is natural gas. It is also noted that
volume of hot flue gases produced from kiln is 65000 Nm3 /h with density of 0.5895
kg/Nm3 and heat capacity of 1.195 kJ/kg ºC.
The other hazardous chemicals and wastes that affect human and the environment by
the manufacturing process of the ceramic tiles are NOx (0.01 kg/m2 ), SOx(0.02
kg/m2 ), CO2 (4.43 kg/m2 ), CO (0.005 kg/m2 ), HF (0.003 kg/m2 ), HCL (0.009
kg/m2 ), Pb (0.00002 kg/m2 ), hazardous waste (0.0033 kg/m2 ), nonhazardous waste
(3.49 kg/m2 ), and noise pollution (478.7 dBA).
4. ReCiPe Method
ReCiPe is an impact assessment method used in LCA which calculates the
environmental impact in two different streams: midpoint level (Problem-oriented) and
end pint level (Damage oriented).
The midpoint indicators focus on single environmental problems such as climate
change, ozone depletion, human toxicity etc.
But the endpoint indicators show the impact on three higher aggregation level such as
resource, human health, and ecosystems.
5. CONCLUSION
The ceramic products have heavy demand in the global market and that have tended to
produce more tiles and leave harmful pollutants to the earth.
Thus, the environmental pollutants affect the entire ecosystem when the ecosystem is
affected.
It may deface the world’s environmentally friendly nature.
The environmental pollution starts from mining operation to the packing of tiles.
Each phase contributes its own amount of pollutants directly or indirectly to the
atmosphere and earth.
The indirect means of affecting the environment may be considered as transportation and
energy consumption. These indirect activities need to be addressed while assessing the
environmental impacts of the ceramic industry globally.
Small plants contribute more amounts of pollutions when compared to the medium plants
and have a heavy impact on global warming, ozone depletion, acidification and
eutrophication.
The LCA methodology includes the identification of global warming, Ozone depletion,
Acidification, Eutrophication, Photochemical oxidation and human-toxicity.
In essence, it is evident from this entire life cycle impact assessment results that the firing
process is the stringent hotspot to the environment.
Therefore, in order to enhance the sustainability of ceramic floor tile industry, it is
essential to ensure the eco-design possibility to the firing process as it causes serious
problems towards the green world.
