Environmental Sustainability Assessment Approach for Palm Oil Production in Malaysia

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1046-1053

J. Environ. Treat. Tech.

ISSN: 2309-1185

Journal web link: http://www.jett.dormaj.com

Environmental Sustainability Assessment Approach

for Palm Oil Production in Malaysia

1,2*

Siti Nur Atikah Yahya , Norhayati Abdullah , Norasikin Ahmad Ludin , Ali Yuzir , Shaza

Eva Mohamad and Iwamoto Koji¹

Algal Biomass iKOHZA, Malaysia-Japan International Institute of Technology (MJIIT), Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA

UTM International, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA

Solar Energy Research Institute (SERI), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Selangor, MALAYSIA

Disaster Prevention and Preparedness Center, Malaysia-Japan International Institute of Technology (MJIIT), Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA

Received: 12/02/2020

Accepted: 26/06/2020

Published: 20/09/2020

Abstract

Malaysia began introducing several sustainability practices to be able to fulfil requirements of foreign legislation that demands stringent

measures in minimizing environmental impact of products and services throughout their life cycles. This includes participation during 2006

for the National Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) program to support national eco-labelling program. This voluntary-based action correlates

with the government's aim to achieve United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 12 and 13 which are responsible consumption

and production and climate action in reducing carbon footprint while using processes that are environmentally friendly. This study

demonstrates in general how LCA approach is applied to palm oil milling and refinery to determine the potential environmental impacts on

these processes by using ReCiPe 2016 method and SimaPro 8.4.0 software. Primary data were retrieved via site-visit to a palm oil mill and

a refinery plant. Data gap were supported by database from previous studies. Based on the findings, palm oil milling contributes the most

significant impact which were global warming potential (GWP), freshwater eutrophication (FEP) and fossil fuel scarcity (FFP) at midpoint

level. Alternative scenario of full utilization of biomass waste and biogas capture for palm oil milling showed a range of 10% to 20% reduction

for ecosystem quality (ED) while 20% to 30% reduction for resource availability (RA) and human health (HH) at endpoint level. The survey

on perception of LCA implementation at industrial level indicated that it is still uncommon due to lack of application and insufficient

knowledge among industry players on its utilization.

Keywords: Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), Palm oil production, Sustainability, Sustainable development goals

Introduction¹

performance in meeting the needs of those in the future [3].

Malaysia palm oil industry began its sustainability initiatives with

introduction of environmental law to protect the land from

deforestation and land-use change, participation as a member of

the established Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO),

sustainability schemes and implementation of Best Management

Practices (BMP) for palm oil plantation. Recently, application of

primary tools through environmental management and life cycle

assessment (LCA) has further reflected the importance of

environmental sustainability in palm oil industry [4].

The start of a vigorous palm oil trading came from the search

of biofuel, a promising renewable energy to replace the finite

source of fossil fuel due to suitable weather conditions, high yield

and cost-effective production. Malaysia saw the promising future

of biodiesel and ventured into the business of palm oil and

managed to rank second as a world palm oil producer [1]

accounting for 39% of world production and 44% of world export.

Consequently, the rapid growth of supply-demand caused

Malaysia palm oil industry to face several environmental issues

which often been raised by non-profit organizations (NGOs) and

green activist [2] which triggered Malaysia’s government to take

a step further by introducing sustainability concept in order to

provide possible solution to minimize existing problems.

The sustainability concept is adopted from the United Nation’s

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Agenda 2030 whereby

that focuses on SDG 12 and 13; responsible consumption and

production and climate action. A sustainable supply chain system

or product is achieved when the needs and aspirations of the

current generation are attained without compromising the

.1 Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)

A sustainability assessment tool namely LCA is utilized to

monitor environmental trade-offs in a product or system. LCA is

methodological assessment supervised by international series of

ISO 14000 standards to assist in creating products and

technologies that are environmentally friendly and for the purpose

of impact evaluation on the environment [5]. Started in 2006,

Malaysia participated in the National Life Cycle Assessment

Project that prolonged for five years to execute several outputs

Corresponding author: Norhayati Abdullah, UTM International, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA, E-

mail: norhayati@utm.my.

1046

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1046-1053

when Ninth Malaysia Plan (2006-2010) ended [4].

as background database located in the software that was used to

produce environmental impact results. The scope of this study

involved two system boundaries (SBs) which were milling and

refinery stages. Both system boundaries involved private mills

which do not have their own plantation and fresh fruit bunches

(FFB) are obtained from other plantation companies. The

databases were collected from input and output of milling stage

(SB I) as well as input and output of refinery stage (SB II).

Allocation assumption was necessary in attributional LCA

modelling since both SBs produce co-products.

Malaysia Palm Oil Berhad (MPOB) was the first to conduct

full LCA on a crude palm oil production to serve as baseline

information for any interested entities in the industry to

implement LCA for their palm oil production [6]. Although there

exist several LCA studies specifically focused on Malaysia’s

palm oil production, most of the studies targeted on nursery and

plantation stages only due to the rise of deforestation and

biodiversity loss issues. Malaysia palm oil industry cannot claim

that their palm oil making processes are hundred percent

sustainable if the whole processes are not equally monitored for

their environmental performance on daily basis. Moreover, the

insufficient environmental database on palm oil production could

also be the reason implementation of LCA on industrial level in

Malaysia palm oil industry is still a voluntary-based action.

Hence, this paper intends to produce another LCA study of palm

oil production in Malaysia particularly on other stages than

nursery and plantation in palm oil production with the hope to

broaden the availability of environmental database and a brief

online survey is conducted to determine the current

implementation of LCA in palm oil production in Malaysia.

2.2 Database collection and analysis method

In inventory analysis, a functional unit (FU) served as a

reference basis where all resources and emissions compiled are

converted into a specific system under investigation [8]. For SB I

and SB II, the FU were 1 ton of fresh fruit bunches (FFB)

processed and 1 ton of crude palm oil (CPO) processed

respectively. Product’s mass was used for allocation process of

the inputs and outputs flow. In terms of selection of mills and

refinery plant, the factors include type of mills (with or without

plantation), processing capacity and location to suits previous

studies’ conditions in order to make the secondary database

relevant to the current study [6][8][9]. Figure 2 represents the

input and output based on the functional units stated for SB I and

SB II.

Material and methods

In this study, LCA framework is used to access environmental

performance of milling and refinery stages in palm oil production.

A brief survey also has been conducted via dispersing online

questionnaire to a specific colony of respondents to determine the

familiarity of LCA among people whose work are closely related

to palm oil sector in Malaysia. There are basically four

components involved in conducting LCA of palm oil production

which are goal and scope definition, life cycle inventory (LCI),

life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) and lastly, interpretation of

the impact assessment [7]. The steps are illustrated in Figure 1.

Main products

Crude palm oil

Co-products

Empty Fruit

Bunches (EFB)

Mesocarp fiber

Shell

0.20 ton

0.200 ton

0.165 ton

0.089 ton

0.053 ton

Materials and fuels

FFB

1.0 ton

Diesel

30 Mega-

Kernel

Joule

Resources

Water

Palm oil mill

effluent (POME)

Emissions

Methane (biogenic)

kilogram

0.360 ton

623 Liter

SB I

6.73

Energy

Steam turbine

Joule

0.8 Mega-

Literature

Carbon dioxide

(

biogenic)

12.20 kilogram

0.006

Transport

Lorry/ truck

Boiler ash

kilogram

Methodology

Flue gas from stack

Particulate matter

kilogram

0.226

0.042

Functional Unit

Carbon monoxide

Goal & Scope definition

System

Materials and fuels

Crude palm oil

Phosphoric acid

kilogram

Bleaching earth

kilogram

Resources

Water

Energy

Electricity

Main products

Refined palm oil

Palm fatty acid

Distillate

Water emissions

Wastewater

1.0 ton

0.45

33.25 ton

0.051 ton

150 Liter

Inventory Analysis

Databases from:



Literature

review

8.0

Alternative

scenario; compare

the environmental



Foreground

data

SB II

Spent bleaching earth 10.0

kilogram

Impact Assessment

Interpretation

Reporting

350 Liter

4.0

Wastewater BOD

4.21

loads

from

resulting

CPO

_k_i_l_o_g_r_a_m_W_a_s_t_e_w_a_t_e_r_C_O_D2

Kilowatt-hour

Transport

Lorry/truck

2.10 kilogram

production

from

mills with and

without biogas

capture, with and

without full

Notes:

Perform modelling

via SimaPro

Figure 2: Inventory analysis of system boundary 1 (SB I) and system

boundary 2 (SB II)

Figure 1: Process flowchart of LCA methodology

The questionnaire to obtain primary data directly from the

representative of palm oil mill and refinery plant were developed

according to the standard procedures in ISO 14041 (1998) [10].

Some of the necessary information include detailed process

flowchart, the input and output flows of the analysed product. In

general, the complete chain of palm oil production starts from

Based on Figure 1, the goal of this study was to build inventory

for milling and refinery stages based on primary and secondary

databases. To obtain primary data, site visit to a local palm oil

mill and a palm oil refinery plant were conducted and data gaps

were supported by relevant database from previous studies as well

1047

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1046-1053

germination of seeds (nursery), growing palm tree (plantation),

FFB transportation to mill, oil extraction (milling), refining CPO

[6][8][11]. Therefore, for inventory of SB I, 0.36 t of POME

produced 6.73 kg of methane and 12.2 kg of carbon dioxide.

However, in alternative scenario done where biogas was

harvested and biomass wastes were recycled, assumption made

was there were no air emissions and zero solid waste.

(

refinery), and waste management [11]. In this study, 1 t (1000

kg) of FFB were used to extract 0.2 t of CPO (SB I), and 1 t of

CPO processed produced 33.25 t of RPO (SB II). Based on the

information given by each representatives of palm oil milling and

refinery plant as well as Malaysia Palm Oil Council (MPOC)

official website [12], the processes involved in palm oil milling

For SB II, the main products were RPO and palm fatty acid

distillate (PFAD). Similar to SB I, the allocation assumption for

refinery process was based on mass of co-products. According to

the data collected at refinery plant, 1 ton of CPO processed

produced roughly 33.25 ton of RPO and 0.051 ton of PFAD based

on 85-90% of PFAD purity. The efficiency of the refinery plant

is about 95% for each ton of CPO processed. To processed 1 ton

of CPO, about 0.8-1.2% of bleaching earth and 4.5% of

phosphoric acid were used. Spent bleaching earth contained about

25% of oil loss which means in 0.8% of bleaching earth used,

there were 8.0 kg of bleaching earth plus 2.0 kg of oil loss. In the

case of amount of wastewater after biological oxygen demand

(BOD) treatment and wastewater for chemical oxygen demand

(COD) treatment, the original values were given as 1200 parts per

million (ppm) and 600 ppm respectively. However, in order to

synchronize with FU, both values were converted to unit of

kilogram (kg).

(SB I) and refinery plant (SB II) were as shown in Figure 3. For

SB I, about 2-5 metric tons of FFB was transported in a minimum

distance of 5 km travelled from plantation to mill.

Meanwhile, in SB II, a truck carrying CPO ranging from 30 to

0 metric ton was used to travel a minimum distance of 20 km

from mills to refinery plant. The main product for SB I was CPO

and the co-products consisted of 19-21% of empty fruit bunches

(EFB), 16-18% of mesocarp fiber, 8-10% of shell, 4-6% of kernel,

and 35-37% of palm oil mill effluent (POME). Kernel undergoes

separate process to produce palm kernel oil (PKO) which was

excluded in SB I. Referring to Subramaniam et al. (2008), based

on the average of 12 palm oil mills, 1 ton of CPO will produce

5.55 m of biogas [6] in which the content of methane in the

biogas usually around 55-65% and 36% for carbon dioxide

Figure 3: Processes involved in each system boundaries (SBs)

1048

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1046-1053

A software that implemented LCA framework called SimaPro

version 8.4.0 was used to conduct impact assessment method

Table 2: Endpoint categories indicators

Midpoint categories

Endpoint

Unit

(

LCIA) and Ecoinvent 3.0 [13], Agri-footprint 3.0 [14][15][16],

ELCD 3.2 [17] were selected as background data sources. This

software can be used to keep track of the environmental

sustainability performance through identifying potential impacts

in products or services throughout their life cycle. ReCiPe 2016

was chosen as the calculation method to conduct the impact

assessment because it is the latest updated method that combined

two popular methods [18] in LCA study which were CML

methodology and Eco-indicator 99 to create broader impact

categories [19]. There are 18 different impact category indicators

developed at midpoint level in ReCiPe 2016 [20] which can be

further classified into three areas of protection at endpoint level

as shown in Tables 1 and 2.

GWP (human health),

WCP (human health),

HOFP (human health),

HTPc, HTPnc, ODP, IRP

and PMFP

Disability-

adjusted loss of

life years

Damage to

health

(DALY)

GWP (terrestrial

ecosystem), GWP

(freshwater ecosystem),

WCP (terrestrial

ecosystem), WCP

Time-

integrated

species loss

(species · year)

Damage to

ecosystem

quality

(freshwater ecosystem)

EOFP (terrestrial

Table 1: Midpoint category indicators according to their

respective areas of protection

ecosystems), TAP, TETP,

FETP, METP, LUC, FEP

and MEP

Midpoint impact

category

Areas of

protection

Abbreviation

Water consumption

potential

Damage to

resource

availability

Surplus cost

WCP

HTPc

SOP and FFP

(Dollar, $)

Human toxicology

carcinogenic potential

Human toxicology non-

carcinogenic potential

Ozone depletion potential

Ionization radiation

potential

Ozone formation potential

Particulate matter

formation potential

Global warming potential

.3 Survey study

HTPnc

ODP

Human

Health (HH)

A Likert-scale questionnaire has been developed where the

key points to be raised were assessed via United Nation’s

Development Program annual report 2018 for Malaysia [21],

Eleventh Malaysia Plan Midterm Review: Chapter 5 on “Pursuing

Green Growth for Sustainability and Resilience” [22], and

previous studies that focused on the perception of sustainability

practices in Malaysia palm oil industry [23][24][25]. Likert-scale

instrument was chosen as it is often used to measure

psychological form, which reflects a person’s affect or cognition

IRP

HOFP

PMFP

GWP

(terrestrial and freshwater

[

26]. Initiation of questionnaire development came from a deep

ecosystem)

Ozone formation

understanding of the target construct, mainly by reading academic

literature on the specified topic. A respondent’s perception and

knowledge on the studied matter are conceptualized from one

extreme to another – low to high, small to large, negative to

positive, or weak to strong [25].

GWP

EOFP

WCP

TAP

(terrestrial ecosystem)

Water consumption

potential (terrestrial and

freshwater ecosystem)

Terrestrial acidification

potential

Terrestrial ecotoxicity

potential

Freshwater ecotoxicity

potential

Marine ecotoxicity

potential

Land use change

Freshwater eutrophication

potential

In this survey, 19 questions were established with the first five

questions involving personal information of the respondents such

as names, designation, email address, organization or company

and years of experience. Several likert-scale options were chosen

in developing the questionnaire as shown in Table 3. A total of 14

questions have been developed with 12 questions using likert-

scale option and the remaining questions were given multiple

choice-based questions. The key points emphasized in the

questions include implementation of UN’s Sustainable

Development Goals (SDGs), effectiveness of Roundtable

Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and International Sustainable

Carbon Certification (ISCC), familiarity of LCA in palm oil

industry in Malaysia, and lastly, actions related to environmental

sustainability that highly reflect a palm oil company’s image

worldwide. This survey study was intended for a specific colony

of respondents whom are closely related to Malaysia palm oil

industry. Therefore, snowball sampling method was used to

obtain target respondents within a six-month period. According

to Kamarudin et al. (2019) [27], snowball sampling can be used

when research respondents are hard to find. It is a technique for

Ecosystem

quality (ED)

TETP

FETP

METP

LUC

FEP

Marine eutrophication

potential

MEP

Resource

availability

Fossil fuel scarcity

Mineral resource scarcity

FFP

SOP

(RA)

1049

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1046-1053

selecting respondents in a network, where it begins with one or a

few people. Interviews and field notes during site-visit to MPOB

and events organized by palm oil organizations also became the

supporting materials to develop the questionnaire. The

questionnaire was largely operated online via a platform called

SurveyMonkey [28].

level, there are specific units according to the type of indicators.

For resource depletion and emission-based impact categories,

mass (kg) reference substance to a specific environmental section

is used. Meanwhile, the unit for land use is represented by area

and time-integrated for one type of land use [8].

Referring to IPCC 2013 for GWP of time horizontal of 20 years

for each greenhouse gas emission (kg CO

of carbon dioxide (CO ) equal to 1 kg CO

(CH ) equivalent to 84 kg CO -eq [20]. This means, for 1 ton of

FFB processed to extract 0.2 t of CPO, 102.9 kg CH and 8645 kg

CO were released to the atmosphere. An alternative scenario was

-eq/ kg emission), 1 kg

-eq and 1 kg of methane

Table 3: Classification of questions with its respective type of

answer choices

Question number

Type of likert-scale

Strongly disagree, disagree, slightly

disagree, slightly agree, agree, strongly

agree

, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11,

conducted to show the impact results if biogas was fully harvested

and biomass waste such as EFB, mesocarp fiber and shell were

fully recycled. As a consequence, damage assessment values of

palm oil milling stage in terms of HH and RA had been reduced

7, 18

Not at all familiar, not so familiar,

somewhat familiar, very familiar,

extremely familiar

Not at all effective, not so effective,

somewhat effective, very effective,

extremely effective

-5

about 20-30% to 1.36 x10 DALY and 2.18 x10 species·year

respectively while ED experienced 10-20% reduction to 28.90

dollars. Figure 6 shows the comparison in the amount of methane

and carbon dioxide gases released to the atmosphere between

default situation and alternative scenario. It can be said that GWP

3, 15

Yes or No

2 2

value reduced significantly from 8645 kg CO -eq to 4268 kg CO -

eq (40-50 % reduction) proving the source of GWP that is POME

treatment has rather became a saving to the environment [6].

Results and discussion

.1 Life cycle impact assessment (LCIA)

In LCIA phase, successfully built inventories are further

characterized into several environmental impact scores to identify

potential environmental impacts. Characterization factors that

signify environmental impact per unit stressor were used to

determine the potential impacts. For example, per kg of resource

used or emission released [20]. Derivation of midpoint

others

solid waste to

landfill

characterization factor (CF ) with a constant midpoint to

endpoint factor per impact category (F) will lead to endpoint

values (Equation [1]):

Production of CPO

Production fo FFB

퐶퐹 = 퐶퐹 × 퐹

[1]

푒

푚

Detailed description for the derivation of constant global

midpoint to endpoint factors are included in ReCiPe2016

method’s guidelines. Based on the findings, palm oil milling

contributed the most significant environmental impacts whereby

refinery process was found to have minor impact on the

environment in comparison [6, 9]. Characterization of LCIA for

GWP

FEP

FFP

Figure 4: Relative contribution of palm oil milling for impact categories

at midpoint level

00.

Waste water - untreated, organic

contaminated EU-27 S System - Copied

from ELCD

ton of FFB discovered that FFB production (plantation stage)

affects most impact assessment results with percentage of relative

contribution more than 50% except for impact category of GWP,

FEP and FFP. For these three impact categories, excluding

plantation stage, palm oil milling was the main contributor.

According to a review study by Izah et al. (2016) [29], palm oil

processing emits three major waste streams; (i) gaseous (pollutant

gases), (ii) liquid such as POME and, (iii) solid such as mesocarp

fibre, palm kernel shell and empty fruit bunch. This explains that

untreated POME and gases emissions from POME treatment may

have contributed to GWP while solid wastes had majorly

influenced FEP and FFP as shown in Figure 4.

Waste water - untreated, organic

contaminated EU-27 S System - Copied

from ELCD

80.

70.

Electricity mix, AC, consumption mix, at

consumer, < 1kV/MY Energy

Transport, truck <10t, EURO1, 50%LF,

empty return/GLO Mass

Palm fruit bunch {MY}| production | Alloc

Rec, U

Diesel, burned in agricultural machinery

{

GLO}| market for diesel, burned in

agricultural machinery | Alloc Rec, U

10.

crude palm oil, CPO (biogas harvesting)

At endpoint level, the damage assessment showed that palm oil

milling had impacted HH, ED and RA at 1.71 x10 DALY, 2.43

Figure 5: Relative contribution in palm oil milling for damage

assessments towards human health (HH), ecosystem quality (ED) and

resource availability (RA) at endpoint level.

x10 species·year and 40.68 dollars respectively and the relative

contribution is shown in Figure 5. These results were parallel to

previous studies where climate change (GWP) and fossil fuels

(

FFP) were the main impacts identified in palm oil milling and it

In reality, there exists palm oil mills that are very self-sufficient

generating their own energy by fully utilizing valuable by-

is highly associated with plantation stage [8][9][30]. For midpoint

1050

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1046-1053

products. However, in terms of biogas harvesting, only 10% of

palm oil mills have biogas plant up to this date [31]. Government

should adopt a friendly biomass supply chain system with

minimum logistic cost and optimized performance as suggested

by Salleh et al. (2019) [32].

performance of plantation companies but selection of specific

plantation areas [33].

strongly disagree

disagree

0.7

slightly disagree

slightly agree

agree

Default

situation

8.9

Alternative

scenario

strongly agree

Question 6

Question 7

.36E-3

2.18E-5

Figure 7: The feedback for topics related to importance of SDGs concept

and environmental assessment in palm oil production

.43E-5

.71E-3

Human Health Ecosystem Quality

Resource

Availability

(USD2013)

Moreover, 42% of the respondents voted for the needs to

(HH) (DALY)

(ED) (species x

year)

establish

standardised measurement tool to appraise

environmental sustainability in producing palm oil. Malaysia

palm oil industry ought to continue the national LCA project

established in Ninth Malaysia Plan (2006-2010) [4] to support the

goals in Eleventh Malaysia Plan Midterm Review on pursuing

green growth for sustainability and resilience. On top of that,

implementation of LCA as part of the mandatory policy

instruments in the palm oil industry could help the country in

overcoming challenges in terms of developing comprehensive

policy planning, establishing a systematic mechanism to report,

monitor and evaluate environmental-related policies and

programme and to increase the awareness among public on

environmental issues [22].

For Questions 13 to 18, introduction to LCA and familiarity of

LCA among industry people in the palm oil sector were raised to

see the amount of people who have first-hand experience on LCA

and the extend of its implementation in the Malaysia palm oil

industry. As expected, nationwide database availability has yet to

be achieved which make LCA implementation at industrial level

somewhat infeasible. This signals the more reason for

government to push forward LCA to be a compulsory action at

industrial level especially when establishment of MSPO Supply

Chain Certification Standard (SCCS) has been commenced in

December 2019 [34]. A study by Jaafar et al. (2020) [35]

concluded that legislation and regulation have the most positive

impact towards environmental performance out of five variables

in green supply chain management practices gives a clearer

purpose for government to critically consider the possibility of

LCA as mandatory policy instrument in palm oil industry.

Figure 6: Comparison of GWP, methane (CH

) and carbon dioxide (CO )

values for LCIA of without biogas capture and with biogas capture in

palm oil milling

.2 Perception of LCA in the palm oil industry

A total of 140 people consisting of palm oil production

researcher, palm oil grower and manufacturer as well as corporate

people in palm oil-related organizations were approached to be

the respondents of the survey study. Despite this, only 26

respondents decided to share their opinions through this survey.

Based on the survey, more than 70% of the total amount of

respondents have more than six years’ experience in the industry

which indicates the feedbacks may be useful for further reference

in improving the policy in Malaysia palm oil industry.

Based on the survey, Questions 6 and 7 touched upon

recognizing government’s effort in introducing SDGs concept in

palm oil industry as well as the importance of environmental

assessment in palm oil production. Referring to Figure 7, it

showed that most respondents were aware on the purpose of

sustainable development goals and realized the importance of

integrating SDG 12 into the palm oil industry. This action is

parallel to the 11 Malaysia Plan Midterm Review [22] where

Malaysia adopted sustainable consumption and production (SCP)

concept to enable environment for green growth, to improve the

awareness on environmental issues towards achieving sustainable

development. Other than that, Questions 8 to 11 evaluated the

effectiveness of existing sustainability practices in the palm oil

industry such as establishment of RSPO and ISCC, local code of

practices in milling operation, current natural conservation

surrounding palm oil millings and the need to create a

standardised measurement tool to monitor environmental

performance of palm oil production processes continuously. A

total of 20% of the respondents agreed that RSPO and ISCC

implementation do not give enough impact towards

environmental sustainability of palm oil production in Malaysia.

Certification schemes like RSPO and ISCC have some flaws as it

certifies palm oil plantation not on the basis of overall

Conclusions

In this study, an environmental sustainability assessment was

conducted via LCA approach to determine potential

environmental impacts that can be avoided or improved in the

processes involved in palm oil production. The focus of LCA

applies in two processes which were palm oil milling and refinery

due to lack of LCA studies in this area. The characterized results

were investigated at two level namely midpoint and endpoint

level. For both levels, refinery plant was found to contribute

insignificant environmental impacts. Therefore, the impact

1051

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1046-1053

assessment result was focused on palm oil milling. At midpoint

level, three potential environmental impacts were found, and they

were global warming potential (GWP), freshwater eutrophication

References

Lim, C., I., et al., Review of existing sustainability assessment

methods for Malaysian palm oil production. 12th Global Conference

on Sustainable Manufacturing. 2015. 26: p. 13-18.

(FEP) and fossil fuels scarcity (FFP). An alternative scenario was

Kon, T., M. Sustainability and responsible production of Malaysian

palm oil– Sime Darby’s perspective [PDF Document]. 2014.

Brundtland, G., H. Our common future. Oxford: WCED (World

Commission on Environment and Development). 1987.

Choong, C., et al., Sustainability in the malaysian palm oil industry.

Journal of Cleaner Production. 2014. 85: p. 258-264.

Mezzullo W.,G, et al., Life cycle assessment of a small- scale

anaerobic digestion plant from cattle waste. Applied Energy. 2013.

102: p. 657-664.

Subramaniam, V., et al., Environmental performance of the milling

process of Malaysian palm oil using the life cycle assessment

approach. American Journal of Environmental Science. 2008. 4(4):

p. 310-315.

done where it was assumed biogas were fully captured and all

biomass waste were recycled to generate electricity to operate the

mill. Significant reduction around 40-50% of GWP was detected

when the assumptions were applied. Due to palm oil milling and

refinery were closely related to upstream activities, it can be said

that most environmental impacts were originated from them.

Hence, it is vital to implement environmental-friendly practices

in the upstream activities to avoid or reduce major environmental

hotspots. Moreover, implementation of biogas capture at palm oil

mills on a larger scale should be seen as a positive move towards

sustainable palm oil production.

In terms of the perception of LCA implementation in

Malaysia palm oil industry, it seems that people in this industry

especially palm oil manufacturers and planters are still lacking

knowledge about the advantage of LCA implementation.

However, they are aware of the importance of sustainable palm

oil production and government’s pledge on sustainable

development goals (SDGs) especially SDG 12 on responsible

consumption and production as well as SDG 13 on climate action.

Currently, most of the actors playing important role in the palm

oil industry only recognized the existence of RSPO, ISCC, BMP

and green technologies as the way to achieve environmental

sustainability in palm oil industry.

ISO 14040. Environmental Management. Life Cycle Assessment.

Principles and Framework. ISO/FDIS. 1997.

Aziz, N., I., H., et al., Life cycle analysis of biogas production from

anaerobic digestion of palm oil mill effluent. Renewable Energy.

2019. 145: p. 847-857.

Norfaradila, J., et al., Life cycle assessment (LCA) for the production

of palm biodiesel: A case study in Malaysia and Thailand. Malaysian

Applied Biology. 2014. 43(1): p. 53-63.

ISO 14041. Environmental Management – Life cycle assessment –

goal and scope definition and inventory analysis. 1998.

Corley, R., H., V., et al., The oil palm. 5th Edition. United Kingdom:

Wiley Blackwell. 2016.

12 Malaysia Palm Oil Council (MPOC). Palm processing flowchart.

Retrieved June 29, 2019 from http://mpoc.org.my/processing-flow-

chart-2/

Aknowledgment

The authors acknowledged the contributions and support

from Malaysia-Japan International Institute of Technology

PRé Consultants. Eco-invent version 3.3 – recycled content – unit.

Updated October 2016.

Blonk Agri-footprint BV. Agri-Footprint - Part 2 - Description of

data. Gouda, the Netherlands. 2017.

(MJIIT), particularly Algal Biomass iKohza and Disaster

Preparedness and Prevention Center (DPPC) for utilization of

SimaPro. The authors wish to thank Universiti Teknologi

Malaysia (UTM) and the Ministry of Higher Education (MOE)

for funding this research under the auspices of FRGS Grant No.

15 BSI. PAS 2050-1: 2012 Assessment of life cycle greenhouse gas

emissions from horticultural products. 2012.

Vellinga, T. V., et al., Methodology used in feedprint: a tool

quantifying greenhouse gas emissions of feed production and

utilization. 2013.

F003. This research was conducted via partial funding and

PRé Consultants. European Life Cycle Database (ELCD) version 3.2.

Updated November 2016.

collaborative work with the Harvard Business School Alumni

Club of Malaysia (HBSACM).

Goedkoop, M., et al., ReCiPe 2008: A life cycle impact assessment

method which comprises harmonised category indicators at the

midpoint and the endpoint level. Report 1: Characterization. 2009.

Heijungs, R., et al., Towards a life cycle impact assessment method

which comprises category indicators at the midpoint and the endpoint

level. Report 1: New designed method. 2003.

Huijbregts, M., et al., Recipe 2016: A harmonized life cycle impact

assessment method at midpoint and endpoint level. Report 1:

Characterization. RIVM Rapport. 2016.

Ethical issue

Authors are aware of, and comply with, best practice in

publication ethics specifically with regard to authorship

(avoidance of guest authorship), dual submission, manipulation

of figures, competing interests and compliance with policies on

research ethics. Authors adhere to publication requirements that

submitted work is original and has not been published elsewhere

in any language.

21 United Nation (UN). Sustainable development goals knowledge

platform – Voluntary National Review 2017. Retrieved December 5,

018 from https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/memberstates

malaysia

Ministry of Economics Affair. 11 Malaysia plan – midterm review.

018. Retrieved February 2, 2019 from

Competing interests

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest that

would prejudice the impartiality of this scientific work.

https://www.mea.gov.my/en/rmk/mid-term-review-eleventh-

malaysia-plan-2016-2020

Aikanathan., S., et al., Sustainable agriculture: A case study on the

palm oil industry. Malaysian Journal of Science. 2011. 30(1): p. 66-

Authors’ contribution

All authors of this study have a complete contribution for data

collection, data analyses and manuscript writing.

Abas, R., et al., A study on the Malaysian oil palm biomass sector

supply and perception of palm oil millers. Oil Palm Industry

Economic Journal. 2011. 11(1): p. 28-41.

1052

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1046-1053

Novelli, E. Sustainability as a success factor for palm oil producers

supplying the European vegetable oil markets. Oil Palm Industry

Economic Journal. 2016. 16(1): p. 8-17.

Nemoto, T., et al., Developing Likert-scale questionnaires. In N.

Sonda, A. Krause (Eds.), JALT2013 Conference Proceedings. 2014.

Kamarudin, H, et al., Integrated water resources management

implementation for Langat and Sagami river basins: A comparison.

Japan Section of The Regional Science Association International.

019.

SurveyMonkey. LCA implementation in palm oil industry. Retrieved

April 4, 2019 on https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/UTMLCA

Izah, S., C. et al., Environmental impacts of oil palm processing in

Nigeria. Biotechnological Research. 2016. 2(3): p. 132-141.

Yusoff, S., et al., Feasibility study of performing a life cycle

assessment on crude palm oil production in Malaysia. International

Journal of LCA. 2007. 12(1): p. 50-58.

Subramaniam, Vet al., Malaysia palm oil’s life cycle assessment

incorporating methane capture by 2020. [PDF Document]. 2014.

Salleh. S., F., et al., Modelling and optimization of biomass supply

chain for bioenergy production. Journal of Environmental Treatment

Techniques. 2019. 7(4): p. 689-695.

World Rainforest Movement. RSPO: The ‘greening’ of the dark palm

oil business. 2010. Retrieved July 12th, 2019 from

https://wrm.org.uy/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/RSPO.pdf

MPOCC. Introduction to MSPO Supply Chain Certification

Standard. Workshop/seminar at Shah Alam Convention Center

(SACC) on August 6, 2019.

Jaafar, A., H., et al., Green supply chain management practices and

environmental performance: A study of employee’s practices in

malaysia chemical related industry. Journal of Environmental

Treatment Techniques. 2020. 8(1): p. 125-131.

1053