Following the Single Market for Green Products, the European Commission released the Product Environmental Footprint Category Rules for Dairy Products (PEFCR-D). According to the PEFCR-D, nitrogen (N) emissions must be calculated as stated by The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the European Environmental Agency ...»»»»
Following the Single Market for Green Products, the European Commission released the Product Environmental Footprint Category Rules for Dairy Products (PEFCR-D). According to the PEFCR-D, nitrogen (N) emissions must be calculated as stated by The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the European Environmental Agency (EMEP/EEA) methods. However, since the IPCC method and the EMEP/EEA method follow different N flows, the estimated N emissions differ at common farm stages resulting in incompatibilities in the reported PEFCR-D emissions from a mass balance perspective. This work proposes a comprehensive approach to calculate N emissions to satisfy the PEFCR-D guideline in a N balanced farm system. The proposed approach coordinates and balances the N flows at each stage in order to estimate the N emissions from the dairy system. In this regard, emissions such as N2O, NH3, NOx, N2 and NO3− are estimated following the IPCC and EMEP/EEA methods from a single N flow in the system. The N losses in the whole dairy farm are estimated to increase 4.41% as a result of the implementing the PEFCR-D in a N balanced system instead of a non-balanced one. Consequently, an increase in environmental impacts of the farm such as Global Warming Potential (6.68%), Marine Eutrophication (4.91%) and Terrestrial Eutrophication (4.26%) were also measured. Moreover, the proposed approach to implement the PEFCR-D enabled the redistribution of emissions between farm stages; particularly relocating N emissions and environmental impacts between manure management and application. This resulted in a decrement on the manure management stage environmental impacts such as Global Warming (−41.88%) and Photochemical Ozone formation (−25.49%). On the other hand, at application stage, increments in Global Warming (26.94%), Marine Eutrophication (8.48%) and Terrestrial Eutrophication (7.52%) were evidenced when contrasting the outcomes between the non-balanced and balanced PEFCR-D calculation approach.^^^^