Current emission modelling and toxicity characterisation of pesticides suffers from several shortcomings. General guidelines on how to align the LCI and LCIA phases for pesticide emission modelling and toxicity assessment in agricultural LCA have been developed in the pesticide consensus effort. The OLCA-Pest project ("Operationalising Life Cycle Assessment for Pesticides", 2017-2020, funded by ADEME) aims at operationalising and harmonising the emission quantification and impact characterisation of pesticides. Based on the analysis of potential gaps and overlaps between the PestLCI Consensus model (PLCM) for pesticide emission modelling, the dynamiCROP plant uptake model for human exposure and toxicity characterisation with special focus on pesticide residues in food crops, and the USEtox scientific consensus model for human toxicity and ecotoxicity characterisation, we propose solutions for the integration of pesticide emissions into LCI databases.
The initial emission distribution fractions from PLCM to air, off-field surfaces and field soil can be directly used as inputs to dynamiCROP, in order to calculate the crop residues and related human toxicity impact factors. The emission fractions can be linked to the emission compartments in USEtox rural air, agricultural soil, and the emissions to off-field surfaces should be distributed between freshwater, agricultural soil, and natural soil. The emissions to the crop will be linked to residue-related human toxicity characterisation factors from dynamiCROP.
For LCI databases and background datasets, the emitted amount of pesticide should be divided into the compartments air/low population density, soil/agricultural, water/river & lake, soil/forest (or soil/natural), and a newly defined compartment "crop". The latter should be further subdivided into 18 archetype crop classes, by distinguishing "food" and “non-food" uses. For an easy integration, default site-generic emissions fractions for different standard application situations (crop classes and pesticide target classes) will be provided. Furthermore, customised emission fractions can be easily calculated by the PestLCI Consensus web tool.
Operationalising the pesticide consensus, the proposed linking of PLCM, dynamiCROP and the toxicity impact assessment by USEtox or other methods provides a consistent framework for the assessment of pesticide emissions and related toxicity impacts for use in agricultural LCA.