Towards sustainability: An integrated life cycle environmental-economic insight into cow manure management

[Display omitted] •A life cycle costing method was developed to optimize the cow raising system.•Using manure as fertilizer yields the greatest environmental and economic benefits.•Manure management choices are responsible for 58% of the carbon footprint variation.•Investment in fertilizer utilization yields up to a 3-fold environmental benefit.•Chinese milk production may reach a carbon peak value of 69 Mt CO2 eq by 2057. Waste management signifies an equilibrium between environmental and economic factors. However, a comprehensive understanding of the integrated life cycle environmental-economic performance of waste management activities remains unclear. To facilitate a systematic linkage between the economic and environmental sectors, a regionalized life cycle assessment-based life cycle costing method was developed based on China’s actual status quo. The cow manure utilization was set as an entry point to explored long-term environmental-economic performance of milk production under various manure utilization pathways. The results show that trade-offs were observed between internal and external costs as well as various environmental indicators. The choice of waste utilization is the focal point of environmental-economic trade-offs in the cow raising system. The optimal environmental-economic performance was achieved through the manure fertilizer utilization pathway, yielding a remarkable three-fold increase in marginal environmental benefits. Compared with fertilizer utilization, the manure direct returning to field reduced the carbon footprint by 12% while induced an external cost of $14.3. The wastewater treatment pathway is $ 5.5 lower in internal costs but $ 11.7 higher in external costs than those of fertilizer utilization. Overall, utilizing manure has potential to mitigate the upward trend of carbon footprint and external costs. However, achieving the carbon peak remains a significant challenge. A promising solution is the recycling of straw resources within cropping systems, particularly in hotspot regions (e.g., Inner Mongolia, Heilongjiang, Hebei, and Shandong). A comprehensive analysis of the dynamic interplay between cropping systems and cow raising systems is critical steps towards realizing a carbon-neutral future within the dairy production.