Environmental Analysis of Manufacturing Processes

该项目的目的是开发模型和建模框架，以表征制造过程的环境性能。 该项目将涉及八种不同的工艺：铣削，磨削，放电加工，磨料水射流加工，砂型铸造，压铸，注塑成型和先进的复合材料高压釜加工。 并且，在七个不同的影响类别：能源，废物，回收，危险材料，水的使用和污染，空气排放和土地排放，通过收集每种情况的数据和清单。 该项目的核心将是开发“负担”设备级模型，以及三个关键环境指标的生命周期材料流模型：能源、废物和熵，以及有毒和有害材料。有了适当的数据，这些模型将能够比较替代工艺的环境性能;替代工艺计划，并提出新的工艺开发。需要这些信息，以便更明确地关注可持续未来的制造工艺开发需求。此外，这些模型将适用于产品设计，以帮助设计的环境。 这项工作的中心主题是开发制造过程的另一种观点。 除了作为附加值非常重要之外，一些过程也可以被视为相反：由于过度使用能源和材料，以及混合和稀释材料，使其无法重新使用，因此可能威胁环境。 这种不同的观点对于正确评价现有和未来进程的“可持续性”是必要的。 此外，这项工作提出了一个新的过程度量的发展-熵变-以评估潜在的回收和再循环使用的材料。该方法建立在香农的信息理论，与几个新的结果来自配置熵的方法。 工作计划涉及八篇本科论文，在一名高级研究生和教师顾问的监督下，并与另外三名在机械加工工艺，铸造工艺以及毒性和危险材料方面具有特殊专业知识的教师合作。 研究结果将通过网页和期刊文章向公众广泛公布。

The purpose of this project is to develop models and a modeling framework to characterize the environmental performance of manufacturing processes. The project will address eight different processes: milling, grinding, electrical discharge machining, abrasive water jet machining, sand casting, die casting, injection molding, and advanced composites autoclave processing. And, in seven different impact categories: energy, wastes, recycling, hazardous materials, use and contamination of water, emissions to air, and emissions to land, by collecting data and inventories for each case. The centerpiece of this project will be the development of "burdened" equipment level models, and life cycle materials flow models for three key environmental indicators: energy, waste and entropy, and toxic and hazardous materials. With the appropriate data, these models will be able to compare the environmental performance of alternative processes; alternative process plans, and propose new process developments. This information is needed to more clearly focus attention on manufacturing process development needs for a sustainable future. Furthermore, these models will be adapted for use in product design to aid design for the environment. The central theme of this work is to develop an alternative view of manufacturing processes. In addition to being hugely important as value adding, some processes could also be seen as the opposite: as potentially threatening the environment by excessive energy and materials usage, and by mixing and diluting materials such that they cannot be recaptured. This alternative view is necessary to properly evaluate the "sustainability" of existing and future processes. In addition, this work proposes the development of a new process metric - the entropy change -- to assess the potential for recapturing and recycling the materials used. The methodology builds on Shannon's information theory, with several new results derived from a configurationally entropy approach. The work plan involves eight undergraduate theses, under the supervision of a senior graduate student and faculty advisor, and with the collaboration of three additional faculty members with particular expertise in machining processes, casting processes, and toxicity and hazardous materials. The results will be made widely available to the public via a web page and journal articles.