Strategic Planning of an Integrated Fuel Production System with a Fair-Sustainable Approach

This work introduces a systematic approach for the optimization of an integrated system to produce fuels and simultaneously capture emissions while accounting for fairness schemes and sustainability metrics. The proposed fair-sustainable approach is relevant because a fair allocation of resources is key for long-term sustainability. The considered stakeholders in the integrated system include refineries, biorefineries, and eco-industries (taken in this work as endeavors for forest plantations resulting in capturing emissions). The optimal allocation of income among these stakeholders is analyzed by evaluating different fairness schemes (social welfare, Rawlsian welfare, and Nash approaches) and a sustainability metric (sustainability weighted return on investment). To incentivize the installation of eco-industries, economic compensation options are included. The applicability of the optimization formulation is demonstrated using a case study of Mexico. However, the model is general and can be applied to different case studies. The results show distinct income allocations under the fairness schemes and the sustainability metric. These allocations are compared to their utopic points. Additionally, the avoided emissions and the generated jobs obtained through the distinct schemes are analyzed. The results also show that the Nash scheme can provide fair trade-offs among the stakeholders’ income and environmental and social functions.