Comparative Life Cycle Assessment of CO2 Capture Technologies for Cement Production in Saudi Arabia

Cement production is associated with substantial environmental impacts and remains a major challenge for industrial decarbonization. This study applied a cradle-to-gate life cycle assessment (LCA) to compare three natural-gas-based Portland cement production scenarios in the Saudi context: a baseline without CO2 capture, monoethanolamine (MEA)-based post-combustion capture, and oxyfuel combustion with CO2 capture. Environmental impacts were quantified using ReCiPe 2016 Midpoint (H) across 18 impact categories. The baseline global warming potential (GWP) was 869.89 kg CO2-eq/t cement, decreasing to 477.87 kg CO2-eq/t with MEA capture and 436.60 kg CO2-eq/t with oxyfuel capture, corresponding to reductions of 45.1% and 49.8%, respectively. However, these reductions were accompanied by increases in all other midpoint impact categories, with water consumption rising by approximately 249% for MEA and 109% for oxyfuel. Marine eutrophication also increased by approximately 137% and 33%, respectively. Under the modelled conditions, oxyfuel achieved the lowest cradle-to-gate GWP, but neither capture technology consistently resulted in lower environmental impacts than the other across all assessed impact categories, indicating that CO2 capture technology selection in the Saudi cement context should consider environmental trade-offs alongside plant-specific conditions.