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Integrating life cycle assessment, energy and emergy analysis

Hau, Jorge Luis
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1407139681

Abstract Details

2002, Master of Science, Ohio State University, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.
Environmental impact of emissions and resource depletion are forcing industry to change its practices. As an immediate solution, industry has applied remediation practices such as, end-of-pipe processing and pollution prevention. However, for long term economic viability and competitiveness, industry has to incorporate environmental and social aspects in its traditional decision-making. Experience has taught that it is more efficient to be proactive, so remediation is not the best solution. Existing approaches for environmentally conscious decision making fail in integrating these aspects in a thermodynamically consistent manner. This indicates a need for developing a rigorous framework for integrating ecological and economic considerations in process engineering decisions. Exergy-based methods have been popular for improving the efficiency and environmental performance of chemical processes. However, they focus mainly on the process scale, and do not consider environmental inputs and impact and often ignore economic aspects. Recently, life cycle assessment has emerged as a powerful impact assessment tool that goes beyond the process boundary. However, it lacks a rigorous thermodynamic framework and focuses on the impact of emissions and consumption of resources, while ignoring ecological products and services. This thesis develops a thermodynamic framework for ecologically conscious process engineering by combining methods from engineering, systems ecology and life cycle assessment. The resulting approach is holistic and provides an accounting tool for incorporating ecological aspects in process engineering. The framework is based on concepts of exergy and emergy analysis, developed in engineering and ecology, respectively. The relationship between these concepts is clarified by showing that emergy expands exergy and cumulative exergy analysis beyond the industrial processes to include ecological products and services. Conditions under which cumulative exergy and emergy are identical are derived. A thermodynamic approach for life cycle impact assessment is also proposed based on expressing the results of impact assessment by the Eco-Indicator99 approach in terms of emergy or exergy. The benefits of these techniques are illustrated by the analysis of chlor-alkali processes and a synthesis gas production plant. These case studies demonstrate that the techniques developed in this work offer a complete range of possible scenarios for the process and that economic and ecological aspects can be integrated in the same analysis. The results also show that it is possible to encounter a trade-off between economic and ecological indicators.
Bhavik R. Bakshi (Advisor)
David Tomasko (Committee Member)
143 p.
Chemical Engineering

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Hau, J. L. (2002). Integrating life cycle assessment, energy and emergy analysis [Master's thesis, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1407139681

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Hau, Jorge. Integrating life cycle assessment, energy and emergy analysis. 2002. Ohio State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1407139681.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Hau, Jorge. "Integrating life cycle assessment, energy and emergy analysis." Master's thesis, Ohio State University, 2002. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1407139681

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1407139681
258
© 2002, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.