Abstract
Some food production industries, like jams’ and marmalades’ ones, use as starting materials semi-finished products for seasonal, technical and quality reasons. To extend the shelf life of foodstuffs, to maintain low the level at which microbial spoilage and deterioration reactions occur, fresh fruits have to be treated. The industry under study uses two different techniques to produce and preserve semi-finished fruits: one is based on deep- freezing and one on ohmic aseptic treatment.
The aim of this work is to use a life cycle approach to compare the global warming potential (GWP) emissions of these two different techniques to guarantee the quality of semi-finished apricots to the customer. The GWP is determined using a detailed Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) analysis, normalizing to the functional unit (one apricots’ kg) all the consumptions and emissions. Data were analysed using SimaPro 8.0.4 software, whereas the Ecoinvent database and information collected from the chosen industrial site were used for the life cycle inventory, according to the reference standard for LCA (i.e., ISO 14040-14044).
