A Hybrid Input-Output, Techno-Economic Life Cycle Modeling Approach to Enable Greener Supply Chains

1236837(Masanet)。制造商、零售商和政府对了解产品的供应链能源和碳“足迹”以及减少此类足迹的方法越来越感兴趣。虽然生命周期评估(LCA)方法在环境足迹估算方面得到了很大的关注，但对于用于分析设计、过程和政策机会以减少产品环境足迹的稳健、定量的方法却相对较少。本研究将开发一种混合供应链建模方法，旨在将投入产出生命周期评价方法与部门级和流程级的技术经济能量分析数据和方法相结合。该方法将允许对构成产品供应链足迹的许多能源和排放源、最终用途技术和部门的离散技术和工艺改进机会进行环境和经济评估。这将通过几项关键任务实现，其中包括：(1)制定方法，将部门能源数据分成对工程分析有意义的最终用途类别；(2)制定统计方法，为每个部门目前的最终用途技术设定基准；(3)按最终用途得出技术经济成本曲线；(4)为应用建模方法开发直观的公共用途计算工具。这项工作将进一步推动分析和统计方法在以技术丰富的方式描述复杂供应链方面的状况，这对于详细设计、供应链参与、工艺和材料选择以及面向产品的政策决策至关重要。这种新的建模方法的成功开发将对生命周期评价和供应链环境管理社区产生巨大影响，并将进一步作为一种理想的教育工具，适用于包括大学预科学生在内的许多层次的学生。制造商可以利用这些信息来了解其供应链中环境改善的最大机会在哪里，以及这种改善的成本可行性有多大，政策制定者可以利用这些信息来确定为减少产品具体影响提供最具成本效益和效率的目标的产品供应链和技术，LCA社区可以利用这些信息在LCA的流程水平上更好地模拟技术变化和技术成本。它还将有助于在LCA和技术经济建模社区之间搭建一座新的桥梁。该项目将开发案例研究，以可视化和分析推动更绿色供应链实践的各种自由度，并将这些案例研究纳入带有大学预科科学课程练习的教学模块。较小的研究问题将被设计成适合本科生的结构。与会者之间的定期会议将确保适当的沟通，并将建立正式的数据管理程序，以确保对建模和模拟数据、材料、程序、软件和教育材料进行适当的存档。除了正常的期刊出版物外，还将开发一个网站来宣传该计划，传播关于教学模块的结果和信息，分享学校的示范经验，并宣布外联活动，如PI的研讨会、本科生的研究开放和教师的暑期活动。

1236837 (Masanet). There is growing interest among manufacturers, retailers, and governments in understanding the supply chain energy and carbon "footprints" of products, as well as in ways to reduce such footprints. While much attention has been paid to life-cycle assessment (LCA) methods for environmental footprint estimation, comparably little attention has been paid to robust, quantitative methods for analyzing design, process, and policy opportunities for reducing product environmental footprints. This research will develop a hybrid supply chain modeling approach, which aims to couple input-output LCA methods with sector- and process-level techno-economic energy analysis data and methods. The approach will allow for both environmental and economic assessment of discrete technology and process improvement opportunities across the many energy and emissions sources, end use technologies, and sectors that comprise a product's supply chain footprint. This will be accomplished through several key tasks that include: (i) developing methods for disaggregating sector energy data into end use categories meaningful for engineering analysis; (ii) developing statistical methods for benchmarking current end use technologies for each sector; (iii) deriving techno-economic cost curves by end use; and (iv) developing an intuitive public use computation tool for applying the modeling methods. The work will further the state of analytical and statistical methods in the characterization of complex supply chains in technology-rich fashion, which is critical for detailed design, supply chain engagement, process and materials selection, and product-oriented policy decisions. The successful development of this novel modeling approach would have a huge impact on the LCA and supply chain environmental management communities, and would further be ideally suitable as an educational tool for students at many levels, including pre-college students. Such information can be used by manufacturers to understand where the greatest opportunities for environmental improvement might be in their supply chains and how cost-feasible such improvements might be, by policy-makers to identify product supply chains and technologies that offer the most cost-effective and efficient targets for reducing product embodied impacts, and by the LCA community to better model technology variation and technology costs at the process level in LCAs. It will also help forge a new bridge between the LCA and techo-economic modeling communities. The project will develop case studies for visualizing and analyzing the various degrees of freedom for driving greener supply chain practices, and will incorporate these case studies into a teaching module with exercises for pre-college science classes. Smaller research problems will be structured to be suitable for undergraduate students. Regular meetings among participants will ensure proper communication, and a formal data management procedure will be in place to ensure proper archiving of modeling and simulation data, material, procedure, software, and educational material. In addition to normal journal publications, a website will be developed to advertise the program, disseminate results and information about teaching modules and sharing demonstration experience in schools, and announce outreach activities such as seminars by PI, research openings for undergraduates, and summer activities for teachers.