Carbon footprint and area use of farmed Norwegian salmon

Abstract

This report presents the carbon footprint and area use of Norwegian farmed salmon that is fed five different diets. It also compares the carbon footprint and occupation of agricultural land of Norwegian farmed salmon from 2010 with Swedish pig and chicken. All results are calculated according to LCA methodology where the functional unit is 1 kg edible product and the system boundaries from fishing/growing of feed ingredients and until the products are at the farm gate. A salmon that is fed the average Norwegian feed diet in 2010 has a carbon footprint of 2.6 kg C02e; it occupies 3.3 m2 agricultural land and requires 115 m2 of sea primary production area. Although only 40% of the diet was of marine origin, the area needed to produce those inputs was much larger than the area used for farming. Results show that changes in the content of marine ingredients can change the final carbon footprint per kilo edible product with± 7 %. The comparison with pig and chicken concluded that salmon has the lowest carbon footprint and occupies least agricultural land. Even an almost "vegetarian" salmon can occupy less agricultural land than chicken. Pig had the highest carbon footprint and the highest occupation of agricultural land.