Estimating Water Footprint of Palm Oil Production: Case Study in Malaysia

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1163-1167

J. Environ. Treat. Tech.

ISSN: 2309-1185

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

Estimating Water Footprint of Palm Oil Production:

Case Study in Malaysia

, 2

1, 2*

1, 3

Noor Salehan Mohammad Sabli , Zainura Zainon Noor , Kasturi Devi Kanniah , Siti

Nurhayati Kamaruddin¹

Centre for Environmental Sustainability and Water Security (IPASA), Research Institute of Sustainable Environment (RISE), Universiti Teknologi

Malaysia, 81310 Johor Bahru, Johor Darul Takzim, Malaysia

School of Chemical and Energy Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia

Department of Geoinformation, Faculty of Geoinformation & Real Estate, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia

Received: 06/02/2020

Accepted: 19/07/2020

Published: 20/09/2020

Abstract

Malaysia is currently facing some issues in fulfilling the high demand in palm oil production, which inevitably led to a rapid expansion

of palm oil industry in Malaysia. Therefore, water-related problems have become a major concern in environmental and social issues

associated to palm oil industries. Inevitably, it is very important that the water consumption in this sector be analysed. Water footprint is

one of the methods that can be used as a tool for sustaining appropriate freshwater resources. The main purpose of this study is to evaluate

water footprint at palm oil mill from fresh fruit bunches to the production of crude palm oil. Water footprint revealed that the main

potential impacts within the system boundary are dominated by water usage at the process through producing crude palm oil and

wastewater effluent. At this stage, the total water input mainly comes from the nearest water resources such as rivers and lakes. In one

operating day, the mill can produce wastewater of 3.81 m3/tonne of CPO. This amount is equivalent to 0.74 m3/tonne of average

production rate of POME for each t of FFB process. At the end of this paper, strategies to optimise the use of water in palm oil mills are

presented.

Keywords: Agricultural Industry, Water degradation, Water footprint, ISO 14046, Sustainable Palm Oil Plantation

Introduction¹

vision for a sustainable development in which food and

agriculture, people’s livelihood and the management of natural

resources are addressed as one (7). Following this trend, all

stakeholders including companies should ensure that the palm

oil industry is sustainably structured to enter global market.

Malaysia, one of the members of Roundtable for Sustainable

Palm Oil (RSPO), is regularly associated with some

sustainability issues including carbon emissions, deforestation,

biodiversity loss, habitat fragmentation, reduction of freshwater

and soil quality. Freshwater reduction and pollution have

become some of the major problems related to oil palm

industries. To evaluate and connect the performance of an oil

palm industries under the outlook of three sustainability pillars

In Malaysia, oil palm plantation area production has

markedly increased from 5.23 million ha in 2013 to 5.85 million

ha in 2018 (1). Currently, after Indonesia, Malaysia is the second

largest oil palm producer in the world with an oil palm planted

area of 5.85 million ha. As one of the main contributors to the

economic growth, annual high export of this industry was RM

7.85 billion in 2017, which has increased from RM 67.92

billion in 2016 (2). Oil palm (Elaeis guineensis) is cultivated in

humid tropical regions in the world such as Indonesia, Malaysia,

Thailand Columbia and Nigeria (3). This plant requires 100 mm

of precipitation monthly or annual rainfall of 2000 mm and is

able to tolerate drought period no longer than three months (4,

(economic, social and environmental pillar), quantitative

). Moreover, palm oil is semi-solid and can stand high

indicators have been proposed as a suitable and effective mean.

Among the indicators concerning the assessment of

environmental impacts, water footprint describes the impacts of

a system or product on water resources from quantitative and

qualitative perspectives. The water footprint (WF) is a useful

indicator to report on total water consumption, water scarcity

level and reduction achieved after implementing response

strategies. Hoekstra et al. (2011) introduced this concept, which

was implemented through Water footprint Assessment (WFA).

WFA is divided into three sub-indicators of WF:

temperature (6).

Overcoming the obstacles faced by the world, FAO has

made the sustainability of food production as 2030 Agenda’s

Coresponding author: Zainura Zainon Noor, (1) Centre for

Environmental Sustainability and Water Security (IPASA),

Research Institute of Sustainable Environment (RISE),

Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Johor Bahru, Johor Darul

Takzim, Malaysia. (2) School of Chemical and Energy

Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Teknologi

Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia. E-mail:

zainurazn@utm.my

•

Green WF - water from rainwater is stored in the root zone

and used by plants through evaporation, transpiration and

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Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 1163-1167

incorporation in the biomass.

consumption in each step of palm oil mill. It was analysed using

water balance approach by (12). In estimating this data, material

balance by (13) was also used. For indirecting water use in palm

oil mill, secondary data from (14) was used. Meanwhile, no

water from rainwater or evapotranspiration is required at the

palm oil mill. Usually, the water from these sources are used

during nursery and plantation stage.

•

Blue WF - irrigation water uptake by plants.

Grey WF – amount of fresh water required to assimilate the

critical pollutants to meet specific water quality standards.

Studies related to WF have been improving over time and

many methods have emerged for calculating and assessing

possible environmental impacts from water consumption. In

014, a research group of Water Use in Life Cycle Assessment

(

WULCA) from UNEP-SETAC developed new water

footprint framework. As defined in (8), LCA is a method used to

assess possible environmental effects for a product or process

over its entire life cycle. WF is a part of the whole LCA.

Subsequently, the LCA-based WF includes the quantification of

water effects related to freshwater use in terms of water

availability footprint and water scarcity footprint as well as

water quality in terms of ecotoxicity, eutrophication and

acidification (9, 10). Both WFA and LCA are complement to

each other and can be used to obtain sustainable freshwater.

The objective of this study is to investigate the water

footprint in the milling process of crude palm oil production at

selection palm oil mills.

Ʃ water consumption in

each stage of CPO

production

Ʃ quantity and quality

of wastewater

WF Production (WFPr

)

WF Wastewater (WF )

WF of Palm Oil Mill

Materials and Methods

This study assessed the Water Footprint (WF) of crude palm

Figure 2: The Calculation Method of WF at Palm Oil Mill

oil production according to the ISO 14046 standard, which

adopted an LCA approach as the framework. The LCA

framework consists of goal and scope definition, inventory

analysis, environmental impact assessment and interpretation of

the result (11). The whole process of this study is shown in

Figure 1. This study adopted a functional unit of water required

to produce 1 t crude palm oil. In determining WF at mill, the

methods were divided into two categories, which were:

For calculating wastewater that came out from CPO process,

formula by (15) was used.

WFw = (Ceffl - Cact)

(Cmax - Cnat)

Effl

Ceffl

Cact

= Effluent volume (volume/time)

= Concentration of pollutant (mass/volume)

Actual concentration of the intake water

(mass/volume)

Cmax

Cnat

= Maximum concentration allowed (mass/volume)

= Concentration in natural form (mass/volume)

.1 Boundary of Study

Figure 3 displays the diagram of the process in palm oil mill.

The boundary of this study was until the production of crude

palm oil (CPO). Therefore, the flow process is shown from the

fresh fruit bunch to the sterilisation process where the bunches

were fully cooked and the wet heat weakened the fruit stem,

making it easy to remove the fruits from bunches by shaking or

tumbling in the threshing machine. Then, the stripper was

utilised to separate the fruits, nuts and fibre. After that, the fruits

were sent to the digester. Digestion is the process of releasing

the palm oil in the fruits through the rupture or breaking down of

oil-bearing cells. At the clarification tank, fine suspended solids

were separated and removed from crude oil. Raw crude oil from

the settling tank (top oil) was combined with recovered oil from

the treatment of the settling tank underflow. The flow process is

highlighted with red arrow in Figure 3. Data for water input

were given from the respondents using questionnaires and

interview session. Primary and secondary data were used in this

study. Primary data were collected by interviewing the

stakeholders. Moreover, these data were collected based on

direct observations at selected palm oil mills. Meanwhile, the

secondary data were obtained by reviewing literature and

Figure 1: LCA Framework including the Significant Steps for WF

. Total water consumption in each stage of CPO process = WF

process (WFPr).

(

. Total quantity and quality of wastewater = WF wastewater

WF ).

Total consumption from both methods will be combined as

total WF at mill (WF ). Simplified water calculation stage can

be referred to Figure 2. The water footprint (WF) of the

production (WFPr) was determined using the data of water

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