Biomass supply chain optimisation via novel Biomass Element Life Cycle Analysis (BELCA)

Formulating the inventory of relevant commodities to assess the life cycle of goods or services (LCI) is highly demanding on time and resources (Suh et al., 2004). Collected information is not always satisfactory to take account of all possible sources of environmental burdens (E-burdens) produced in the commodity supply chain. Several pre-assessment methods have been proposed to serve this function, although these have identified limitations; lack of previous experience and use of subjective cut off criteria are the most frequent weaknesses found (Suh, 2006). An objective pre-assessment method was developed as part of a life cycle analysis (LCA) for different pigmeat supply chain (PSC) scenarios.

Download Full-text

Eco-Audit and Environmental Impacts of Products

Applied Mechanics and Materials ◽

10.4028/www.scientific.net/amm.834.34 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 834 ◽

pp. 34-39

Author(s):

Cătălin Gheorghiță ◽

Vlad Gheorghiță

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Environmental Impact ◽

Life Cycle Analysis ◽

Raw Materials ◽

Embodied Energy ◽

Water Usage ◽

Design Decisions ◽

Sustainability Criteria ◽

Life Cycle Stages

Eco-audit is a tool to find the environmental impact of the product across all life cycle stages and for identify the problems in all aspects of a supply chain, from extraction of raw materials to manufacturing, distribution, use and disposal. The purpose of an analysis of a product is to establish the embodied energy, water usage, annual CO2 to atmosphere, carbon foot print, recycle fraction in current supply, toxicity, approximate processing energy and sustainability criteria. Knowledges to guide design decisions are needed to minimize or eliminate adverse eco-impacts. In eco-audit analysis, will be created material charts, processes selection and life cycle analysis allowing alternative design choices to meet the engineering requirements and reduce the environmental impact. The application presented in this paper uses only environmentally friendly properties of Ashby's database.

Download Full-text

Life Cycle Analysis of ONE Future's Supply Chain Methane Emissions

10.2172/1513821 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Timothy J. Skone ◽

James Littlefield

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Life Cycle ◽

Life Cycle Analysis ◽

Methane Emissions

Download Full-text

RETRACTED: Biomass supply chain optimisation for Organosolv-based biorefineries

Bioresource Technology ◽

10.1016/j.biortech.2014.02.109 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 159 ◽

pp. 387-396 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Sara Giarola ◽

Mayank Patel ◽

Nilay Shah

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Biomass Supply ◽

Supply Chain Optimisation

Download Full-text

A Biomass Supply Chain Optimization Framework With Linear Approximation of Biomass Yield Distributions for Improved Land Use

Volume 6: Energy ◽

10.1115/imece2019-11399 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Nathanial Cooper ◽

Anna Panteli ◽

Nilay Shah

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Biomass Yield ◽

Supply Chain Optimization ◽

Optimization Framework ◽

Biomass Supply ◽

Yield Information ◽

Supply Chain Optimisation ◽

The Impact

Abstract Biomass and the bio-economy have strong potential to help shift dependency away from petroleum. Supply chain optimisation (SCO) has been used to help other industries and can be used to boost biomass industry viability. Biomass supply chain models frequently average the biomass yield of large tracts of land in their calculations. However, there can be large variation in the biomass yield within those tracts, losing useful information. This work presents a biomass SCO framework which approximates the available quality of land by piecewise linearly approximation of the biomass yield distribution, and incorporates this information into the optimisation. The linear estimates of the biomass yield distributions allow the SCO model to make more informed decisions about quantity and location of biomass growth operations, affecting all downstream decisions. A case study of mainland Great Britain has been examined using the framework to illustrate the impact of retaining biomass yield information in the optimisation, versus averaging the yield across tracts of land. The case study found that using biomass yield linear estimates reduced the overall land usage by 10%. Further, it improved biomass output, which increased the quantity of bio-products produced. All of this led to an increase in the overall profit.

Download Full-text