1. Sustainability assessment of biorefinery production chains: A combined LCA-supply chain approach.
- Author
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Khoo, Hsien H., Eufrasio-Espinosa, Rafael M., Koh, Lenny S.C., Sharratt, Paul N., and Isoni, Valerio
- Subjects
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CORN stover , *GEOGRAPHIC information systems , *RICE straw , *SUSTAINABILITY , *SUPPLY chains , *LAND use - Abstract
The integration of a model combining multi-layer dimensions of Life cycle assessment (LCA), external Supply Chain (SC) risk factors and Geographical Information System (GIS) is lacking; in order to fulfil this research gap this article proposes an integrated model combining LCA, SC-risk factors and GIS. This research assesses the sustainability of various supply chains representing bio-derived levulinic acid production. The feedstock supplies are corn stover from US, and rice straw from Thailand, China and India. A combined life cycle assessment (LCA) and supply chain (SC) approach, from farm to final bio-derived product distribution and sales are investigated. GIS is applied to provide resolution of spatial and location datasets for the supply chain. The proposed framework is tested on 8 scenarios for the supply and distribution of 100 kilo-ton levulinic acid delivered to China (35%), US (30%), Germany (20%), Japan (10%) and Singapore (5%). The results showed that scenarios 5 and 6 are observed to have the highest overall (external, macro) risks. An overall quantitative (scaled) assessment highlighted that scenarios 1 and 2 are observed to both have the least impacts. With revenue as the main SC priority, scenario 7 gained the advantage of displaying an overall reasonable (moderate) sustainability performance. Based on the limitations of the present integrated model, a future research framework was suggested to include i) multi-criteria optimization methods; ii) land use change (LUC); iii) Water Footprint; iv) dynamic modelling. Image 1 • Combined LCA and supply chain (SC) is modelled for bio-derived levulinic acid. • GIS used to identify locations of feedback supply to proposed biorefineries. • Biomass feedstock include US stover; and rice straw from Thailand, China and India. • Land footprint, costs and revenues, external SC risks and impacts of 8 scenarios. • Future framework/research is suggested to include LUC, WF and dynamic optimization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2019
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