Fraunhofer Institute for Surface Engineering and Thin Films IST, Bienroder Weg 54E, Braunschweig 38108, Germany.
School of Engineering, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU, United Kingdom.
Environ Sci Technol. 2023 Mar 28;57(12):5056-5067. doi: 10.1021/acs.est.2c04080. Epub 2023 Mar 13.
The large-scale adoption of low-carbon technologies can result in trade-offs between technical, socio-economic, and environmental aspects. To assess such trade-offs, discipline-specific models typically used in isolation need to be integrated to support decisions. Integrated modeling approaches, however, usually remain at the conceptual level, and operationalization efforts are lacking. Here, we propose an integrated model and framework to guide the assessment and engineering of technical, socio-economic, and environmental aspects of low-carbon technologies. The framework was tested with a case study of design strategies aimed to improve the material sustainability of electric vehicle batteries. The integrated model assesses the trade-offs between the costs, emissions, material criticality, and energy density of 20,736 unique material design options. The results show clear conflicts between energy density and the other indicators: i.e., energy density is reduced by more than 20% when the costs, emissions, or material criticality objectives are optimized. Finding optimal battery designs that balance between these objectives remains difficult but is essential to establishing a sustainable battery system. The results exemplify how the integrated model can be used as a decision support tool for researchers, companies, and policy makers to optimize low-carbon technology designs from various perspectives.
大规模采用低碳技术可能会在技术、社会经济和环境方面产生权衡。为了评估这些权衡，需要整合通常孤立使用的特定学科模型，以支持决策。然而，综合建模方法通常仍停留在概念层面，缺乏实施工作。在这里，我们提出了一个综合模型和框架，以指导低碳技术的技术、社会经济和环境方面的评估和工程。该框架通过一个旨在提高电动汽车电池材料可持续性的设计策略案例研究进行了测试。综合模型评估了 20736 种独特材料设计方案在成本、排放、材料关键程度和能量密度方面的权衡。结果表明，能量密度与其他指标之间存在明显冲突：即当优化成本、排放或材料关键程度目标时，能量密度会降低超过 20%。找到在这些目标之间平衡的最佳电池设计仍然很困难，但对于建立可持续的电池系统至关重要。结果说明了综合模型如何可以作为研究人员、公司和决策者的决策支持工具，从各个角度优化低碳技术设计。
