Soil organic carbon (SOC) plays a fundamental role in soil health, and its storage in soil is an important element to mitigate climate change. How to include this factor in Life Cycle Assessment studies has been the object of several papers and is still under discussion. SOC storage has been proposed as an additional environmental information in some applications of the Product Environmental Footprint (PEF). In the framework of wider activity aimed at producing the PEF of olive oil, the RothC model was applied to an olive cultivation located in Lazio region (Italy) to calculate the SOC storage and assess four scenarios representing different agricultural practices. RothC applicability, possible use of its results for improving product environmental performance, and relevance of SOC storage in terms of CO_2eq compared to greenhouse gas emissions of the life-cycle of olive oil are discussed in this paper. According to the results, in all scenarios, the contribution in terms of CO_2eq associated with SOC storage is remarkable compared to the total greenhouse gas emissions of the olive oil life-cycle. It is the opinion of the authors that the calculation of the SOC balance allows a more proper evaluation of the agricultural products contribution to climate change, and that the indications of the scenarios analysis are useful to enhance the environmental performance of these products. The downside is that the application of RothC requires additional data collection and expertise if compared to the execution of PEF studies.

The production of wind energy is one of the most mature technologies in the field of renewable energy, and the rapid technological advances bring out the need to replace the old models of wind turbines with more efficient versions. Operators must plan the management of a large amount of resource flows from the end-of-life wind farm disposal. The use of composite materials, in particular epoxy resins reinforced with glass fibers (Glass Fiber Reinforced Polymer - GRFP), most used in the wind blades, makes the material separation and recovery operations quite complex. The purpose of the study is to compare the environmental performance of the life cycle of two treatment processes (mechanical recycling and co-processing in cement kiln), identified by literature as possible technologies for the treatment of GFRP, including also the environmental benefits obtainable through the valorisation of both the waste material itself (used as fuel) and the secondary material obtained at the end of the treatment process. The LCA study provides some general considerations about the possible recycling and recovery of GFRP material contained in wind turbine blades. In general terms, it can be stated that co-processing in cement kilns is a highly efficient process because it allows energy to be recovered from the waste material and part of it to be integrated into the clinker production process.