Smith Raymond L, Tan Eric C D, Ruiz-Mercado Gerardo J
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Research and Development, 26 W. Martin Luther King Dr., Cincinnati, OH 45268, United States.
National Bioenergy Center, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, 15013 Denver West Parkway, Golden, CO 80401, United States.
ACS Sustain Chem Eng. 2019;7(12):10937-10950. doi: 10.1021/acssuschemeng.9b01961.
As manufacturing processes are developed through the early stages of technology readiness, various assessments can be used to evaluate their performance. Performance indicators describe processes by transforming attributes into scores that represent desirable objectives. One type of assessment is obtained by determining the life cycle inventories of inputs and outputs for processes. For a functional unit of product, the user finds the resources used and the releases to the environment, which can be compared to results for similar processes and/or combined with other processes in the life cycle. In this work, an expanded range of process inputs and releases is modeled, including forklift/loader, fugitive, storage, boiler, and cooling tower emissions. A generic scenario approach for the cooling tower releases provides a first approximation of emission and wastewater flows. These inventory values are used in performance indicators that can be placed on a scale between fixed best- and worst-case limits with the GREENSCOPE methodology, thus allowing comparisons across various technologies. The processes of interest are two conversion pathways for producing cellulosic ethanol from biomass via thermochemical and biochemical routes. The results can be used in risk assessments, decision making, evaluation of research, and in spurring future technology development.
随着制造工艺在技术就绪的早期阶段不断发展，可以使用各种评估方法来评估其性能。性能指标通过将属性转化为代表理想目标的分数来描述工艺。一种评估方法是通过确定工艺输入和输出的生命周期清单来获得。对于产品的一个功能单元，用户可以找出所使用的资源以及向环境的排放，这些可以与类似工艺的结果进行比较和/或与生命周期中的其他工艺相结合。在这项工作中，对更广泛的工艺输入和排放进行了建模，包括叉车/装载机、无组织排放、储存、锅炉和冷却塔排放。冷却塔排放的通用情景方法提供了排放和废水流量的初步近似值。这些清单值用于性能指标中，通过GREENSCOPE方法可以将其置于固定的最佳和最坏情况极限之间的尺度上，从而允许对各种技术进行比较。感兴趣的工艺是通过热化学和生化途径从生物质生产纤维素乙醇的两种转化途径。结果可用于风险评估、决策、研究评估以及推动未来技术发展。
