LIFE CYCLE ANALYSIS LCA of wooden pallet Wooden packagaing materials such as crates and pallets are increasingly used with the rise in global trade. Pallets are flat transport structures used in the tranport packaging by almost all industries, including the shipping and transportation of groceries, beverages, drums, chemicals, etc. In the shipping industry, good and containers are strapped onto pallets and transported in bulk units to move goods around easily in bulk units. Wooden pallets are generally manufactured from hardwood and softwood sawn lumber material. Pallets at the end of their life are typically dismantled and recycled or made into other items. Table shown below is a general life cycle assessment of a wooden pallet.
Energy to extract and transport
Embodied Energy
Dust, machine emission
Atmospheric emission
Energy Fuel Atmospheric emission consumption Energy to dismantle
Dust emission , noise
Life cycle assessment of wooden pallet on site.
Sourcing of suitable wooden pallets
Dust emission , noise
Noise, Energy
Sander wooden pallets
Dismantle of wooden pallets
Finishing of wooden pallets
Energy
Transportation to site
Ready made wooden pallet benches installed in the garden
We recycled wooden pallets from different factories. Before we dismantle the pallet, we sand the recycled pallet using sander machine to make it looks clean and new. After that, we dismantled the smaller components of the pallets to make the pallets into our desired sizes for the benches. We applied a layer of chalet shellac onto the wooden pallets as finishing before we transport them to the site for installation.
Source : http://www.scdigest.com/assets/On_Target/08-02-06-1.php
From the table above shown that, the final industrial waste of a wooden pallet is much lesser than plastic pallet and the raw material consumption of wooden pallet is also less than the raw material consumption of plastic pallet. Besides that, the most obvious advantage of wooden pallet is that pallets are a renewable fuel, which is considered to be co2 neutral and thus not provide any net contribution to the greenhouse effect. Due to this, we decided to use the wooden pallet instead of plastic pallet to make the benches of the garden despite the wooden pallet is not resistance to water during rainy season. Therefore, we applied wood finishes which is shellac to give a layer of protection to the benches made with wooden pallets. Other than that, another reason for the decision is that wood is more durable than plastic in terms of weight. LCA of bamboo Bamboo, like true wood, is a natural composite material with a high strength-to-weight ratio useful for structures. In its natural form, bamboo as a construction material is traditionally associated with the cultures of South Asia, East Asia and the South Pacific, to some extent in Central and South America, and by extension in the aesthetic of Tiki culture. In China and India, bamboo was used to hold up simple suspension bridges, either by making cables of split bamboo or twisting whole culms of sufficiently pliable bamboo together. Bamboo is often used in the construction industry because of its good engineering properties and it is a feasible substitute for other materials for housing and construction sector. Besides, bamboo has high tensile strength, it can be easily worked upon by simple tools .It can also resist forces created by high velocity wind and earthquake. Not only that, bamboos are eco friendly, energy efficient and cost effective. The cutting of bamboo also does not give big impact to the environment as bamboo is a fast growing species. Table shown below is a life cycle assessment of bamboo on site.
Life cycle
assessment of bamboo on site. Sourcing of suitable bamboo
Dust emission, Noise
Cutting of bamboo
Energy
Transportation of bamboo
Finishing of bamboo
Bamboos used as structure for canopy on site
We find suitable bamboos for our canopy structure. We cut it into according to our desired sizes and cut holes at both ends of the bamboos for connection purposes. After we have installed the bamboos firmly, we applied a layer of shellac on the bamboos as a protection.
Source : http://design490.org/bamboo-the-new-building-material/
From the comparison table shown above, overall bamboo has better properties when compared to wood which is a quite similar material. Thus, we decided to choose bamboo as the whole structure of the canopy of our garden. First of all, bamboo is 100% recyclable material which can bring out the message of sustainability. On top of that, as the structure of a canopy we need strong materials that is safe to use therefore the use of bamboo is suitable as it is resistant to termites and it can withstand strong wind.
