ANALYSIS OF GREENHOUSE GASES EMISSIONS AT THE UNIVERSITY RESTAURANT IN UnB ORGANIC SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT

Abstract

The increasing levels of consumption, in addition to the use of single-use products, as led to significant environmental degradation, contributing to an increase in greenhouse gas emissions. Landfills are the world's third-largest anthropogenic source of methane emissions (MARKGRAF; KAZA, 2016) due to the large amount of organic waste disposed. Technologies for treating organic waste, such as composting and anaerobic digestion, have been extensively applied to reduce the resulting air emissions. Thus, the study examines three scenarios for managing organic solid waste generated at the University Restaurant at the Darcy Ribeiro Campus of the University of Brasília. Based on the application of the Life Cycle Assessment method and the Ecoinvent database, the results show that composting, which resulted in an avoided emission of approximately 2,38 kg de CO₂eq per ton of organic solid waste treated, has a higher contribution in comparison to anaerobic digestion, which yielded avoided values of -39,12 kg de CO₂eq due to electricity generation.