scholarly journals Operational Management Implemented in Biofuel Upstream Supply Chain and Downstream International Trading: Current Issues in Southeast Asia

Energies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 1799 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hoo Ying ◽  
Cassendra Phun Chien ◽  
Fan Yee Van
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Supply Chain ◽  
Southeast Asia ◽  
Research Methods ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Biofuel Production ◽  
Management Research ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Biofuel Supply Chain ◽  
Operational Management

Bioenergy is one of the alternatives to secure energy demand, despite increasing debate on the sustainability of using bioenergy as a renewable source. As the source is disseminated over a large area and affected by seasonality, the potential benefit is highly dependent on other cost and benefit trade-offs along the supply chain. This review paper aims to assess operational management research methods used in biofuel supply chain planning, including both upstream production and international downstream trading. There have been considerable operational management studies done on upstream processes in biofuel production based on different strategic and tactical decision making of a single or multiple feedstocks, considering economic and environmental factor. However, the environmental consideration is often limited to carbon emission where the other environmental impact such as land-use change, biodiversity loss, irrigation and fertilisation are often being overlooked. Biofuel supply chain and trading at international level remain as an apparent research potential where only limited numbers of global energy models explicitly simulate international bioenergy trade. The leading biofuel producing countries in Southeast Asia: Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand, are selected as a case study to investigate further on how the supply chain management model could be applied considering the existing biofuel support policies. This study is expected to contribute to the selection of operational management research methods used for decision making under robust policy context, followed by several recommendations.

scholarly journals Integrating IVHM and Asset Design

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian K Jennions ◽  
Octavian Niculita ◽  
Manuel Esperon-Miguez
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Supply Chain ◽  
System Design ◽  
Design Process ◽  
Systems Engineering ◽  
Health Management ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
Fully Integrated ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Causes Of Failure

Integrated Vehicle Health Management (IVHM) describes a set of capabilities that enable effective and efficient maintenance and operation of the target vehicle. It accounts for the collecting of data, conducting analysis, and supporting the decision-making process for sustainment and operation. The design of IVHM systems endeavours to account for all causes of failure in a disciplined, systems engineering, manner. With industry striving to reduce through-life cost, IVHM is a powerful tool to give forewarning of impending failure and hence control over the outcome. Benefits have been realised from this approach across a number of different sectors but, hindering our ability to realise further benefit from this maturing technology, is the fact that IVHM is still treated as added on to the design of the asset, rather than being a sub-system in its own right, fully integrated with the asset design. The elevation and integration of IVHM in this way will enable architectures to be chosen that accommodate health ready sub-systems from the supply chain and design trade-offs to be made, to name but two major benefits. Barriers to IVHM being integrated with the asset design are examined in this paper. The paper presents progress in overcoming them, and suggests potential solutions for those that remain. It addresses the IVHM system design from a systems engineering perspective and the integration with the asset design will be described within an industrial design process.

BIM-enabled sustainability assessment of material supply decisions

2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 668-695 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alireza Ahmadian F.F. ◽  
Taha H. Rashidi ◽  
Ali Akbarnezhad ◽  
S. Travis Waller
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Supply Chain ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Sustainability Assessment ◽  
Social Impacts ◽  
Life Cycle Thinking ◽  
Bottom Line ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Material Supply ◽  
Trade Offs

Purpose Enhancing sustainability of the supply process of construction materials is challenging and requires accounting for a variety of environmental and social impacts on top of the traditional, mostly economic, impacts associated with a particular decision involved in the management of the supply chain. The economic, environmental, and social impacts associated with various components of a typical supply chain are highly sensitive to project and market specific conditions. The purpose of this paper is to provide decision makers with a methodology to account for the systematic trade-offs between economic, environmental, and social impacts of supply decisions. Design/methodology/approach This paper proposes a novel framework for sustainability assessment of construction material supply chain decisions by taking advantage of the information made available by customized building information models (BIM) and a number of different databases required for assessment of life cycle impacts. Findings The framework addresses the hierarchy of decisions in the material supply process, which consists of four levels including material type, source of supply, supply chain structure, and mode of transport. The application is illustrated using a case study. Practical implications The proposed framework provides users with a decision-making method to select the most sustainable material alternative available for a building component and, thus, may be of great value to different parties involved in design and construction of a building. The multi-dimensional approach in selection process based on various economic, environmental, and social indicators as well as the life cycle perspective implemented through the proposed methodology advocates the life cycle thinking and the triple bottom line approach in sustainability. The familiarity of the new generation of engineers, architects, and contractors with this approach and its applications is essential to achieve sustainability in construction. Originality/value A decision-making model for supply of materials is proposed by integrating the BIM-enabled life cycle assessment into supply chain and project constraints management. The integration is achieved through addition of a series of attributes to typical BIM. The framework is supplemented by a multi-attribute decision-making module based on the technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution to account for the trade-offs between different economic and environmental impacts associated with the supply decisions.

scholarly journals The hidden side of sustainable operations and supply chain management: unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs and tensions

2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (12) ◽  
pp. 1749-1770
Author(s):  
Stelvia V. Matos ◽  
Martin C. Schleper ◽  
Stefan Gold ◽  
Jeremy K. Hall
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Supply Chain ◽  
Supply Chain Management ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Sustainable Operations ◽  
Chain Management ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Crucial Effect

PurposeThe research is based on a critically analyzed literature review focused on the unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs and tensions of sustainable operations and supply chain management (OSCM), including the articles selected for this special issue.Design/methodology/approachThe authors introduce the key concepts, issues and theoretical foundations of this special issue on “The hidden side of sustainable operations and supply chain management (OSCM): Unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs and tensions”. The authors explore these issues within this context, and how they may hinder the authors' transition to more sustainable practices.FindingsThe authors present an overview of unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs, tensions and influencing factors from the literature, and identify how such problems may emerge. The model addresses these problems by highlighting the crucial effect of the underlying state of knowledge on sustainable OSCM decision-making.Research limitations/implicationsThe authors limited the literature review to journals that ranked 2 and above as defined by the Chartered Association of Business Schools Academic Journal Guide. The main implication for research is a call to focus attention on unanticipated outcomes as a starting point rather than only an afterthought. For practitioners, good intentions such as sustainability initiatives need careful consideration for potential unanticipated outcomes.Originality/valueThe study provides the first critical review of unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs and tensions in the sustainable OSCM discourse. While the literature review (including papers in this special issue) significantly contributes toward describing these issues, it is still unclear how such problems emerge. The model developed in this paper addresses this gap by highlighting the crucial effect of the underlying state of knowledge concerned with sustainable OSCM decision-making.

scholarly journals Life cycle thinking in sustainability assessment of bioenergy systems

2021 ◽  
Vol 277 ◽  
pp. 01001
Author(s):  
Shabbir H. Gheewala
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Sustainability Assessment ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Life Cycle Thinking ◽  
Gas Emissions ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Biofuel Supply Chain

Increasing population and affluence have had a direct influence on increasing the energy demand of nations across the globe. Energy from non-renewable fossil resources has associated emissions of greenhouse gases contributing to climate change, a major challenge facing us today. The governments of many countries have tried to address the twin issues of limited local availability of fossil resources and greenhouse gas emissions by promoting the use of bioenergy. Bioenergy is not automatically sustainable unlike popular belief. Assessing its sustainability using a life cycle thinking approach reveals many caveats, not only regarding greenhouse gas emissions but also other environmental impacts that are often ignored. The environmental assessment of palm oil-based biodiesel shows the trade-offs when considering all the life cycle stages of the biofuel supply chain and also when multiple impact categories are considered. The so-called carbon neutrality becomes questionable and other impacts from agriculture arising due to the use of land and agrochemicals are also seen to be very significant. Ignoring these in policymaking could result in serious unintended consequences. Thus, the importance of life cycle thinking in sustainability assessment is illustrated. This will be critical in addressing national needs while also moving towards the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.

scholarly journals Social preferences and supply chain transactions: an analysis with Brazilian decision makers

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 1288
Author(s):  
Glaucia Miura Ota ◽  
Adriano Maniçoba da Silva
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Supply Chain ◽  
Social Preferences ◽  
Performance Status ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Supply Contracts ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Decentralized Decision Making ◽  
Influence Behavior ◽  
Normal Status

Supply contracts amongst suppliers and buyers can be used as powerful mechanisms to manage trade-offs between risks and costs in negotiations amid the constituent parts of the supply chain. In decentralized decision-making, as a trade transaction between a wholesaler and a retailer, social preferences can influence behavior of these decision makers. The objective of this study was to verify the effect of social preferences on transactions in supply chains, using Brazilian individuals with the purpose of comparing the results with those obtained in other countries. The methodology proposed in this study was quantitative, as variables already studied by previous studies were investigated. An experiment was conducted with three handlings (normal, status and relationship) simulating buying and selling situations in a supply chain. The results indicated that highlighting the performance status of a supply chain improves the efficiency of the chain when compared to normal transactions, or when there is a relationship between the links.

Management Research Methods

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
Phyllis Tharenou ◽  
Ross Donohue ◽  
Brian Cooper
Keyword(s):  
Research Methods ◽  
Management Research
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