Environmental impact of carbon fibers fabricated by an innovative manufacturing process on life cycle greenhouse gas emissions

Abstract In this study, the GHG emission of an advanced CF (carbon fiber) production process with flame resistant fibers was compared with that of the conventional CF production process with polyacrylonitrile (PAN)-based fibers. Cradle-to-gate LCA approach was taken. Up-scaling method was used to estimate GHG emissions from the lab scale to the production scale. The analysis concludes: • The GHG emissions of the conventional CFs and the advanced CFs were evaluated using an upscaling method. The effect of upscaling was particularly significant with the production of flame-resistant fibers. • The total GHG emission resulting from producing CFs by the conventional method and the advanced methods is 24.83 kg-CO2eq/kg and 19.29 kg-CO2eq/kg, respectively, when the production scale is 3000 TPY (ton per year), representing 20% GHG emission reduction. • The main reason for this reduction is that the advanced CF technology enables liquid-phase stabilization in fiber preparation stage with the newly developed flame resistant fibers. As shown in the above summary, this advanced process has great potential to reduce the GHG emissions of CFs.