INDUSTRIAL ECOLOGY AND SUSTAINABLE ENGINEERING

SUB Hamburg

A 2011/7653

INDUSTRIAL ECOLOGY AND SUSTAINABLE ENGINEERING

T.E. Graedel Yale University B.R. Allenby Arizona State University

Boston Columbus Indianapolis New York San Francisco Upper Saddle River Amsterdam Cape Town Dubai London Madrid Milan Munich Paris Montreal Toronto Delhi Mexico City Sao Paulo Sydney Hong Kong Seoul Singapore Taipei Tokyo

Contents

Preface

PART I

17

INTRODUCING THE FIELD Chapter 1

Humanity and Technology

23 23

1.1 An integrated system 23 1.2 The tragedy of the commons 24 1.3 Technology at work 26 1.4 The master equation 27 1.5 Technological evolution 29 1.6 Addressing the challenge 33 Further Reading 33 Exercises 33 Chapter 2 The Concept of Sustainability

35

2.1 Is humanity's path unsustainable? 35 2.2 Components of a sustainability transition 37 2.3 Quantifying sustainability 39 2.3.1 Example 1: Sustainable supplies of zinc 40 2.3.2 Example 2: Sustainable supplies of germanium 41 2.3.3 Example 3: Sustainable production of greenhouse gases 42 2.3.4 Issues in quantifying sustainability 43

8

Contents

2.4 Linking industrial ecology activities to sustainability 44 2.4.1 The grand environmental objectives 44 2.4.2 Linking the grand objectives to environmental science 45 2.4.3 Targeted activities of technological societies 48 2.4.4 Actions for an industrialized society 50 Further Reading 51 Exercises 51 Chapter 3

Industrial Ecology and Sustainable Engineering Concepts

52

3.1 From contemporaneous thinking to forward thinking 52 3.2 The greening of engineering 55 3.3 Linking industrial activity with environmental and social sciences 56 3.4 The challenge of quantification and rigor 57 3.5 Key questions of industrial ecology and sustainable engineering 58 3.6 An overview of this book 59 Further Reading 61 Exercises 62 PART II

FRAMEWORK TOPICS

Chapter 4 The Relevance of Biological Ecology to Industrial Ecology

63 63

4.1 Considering the analogy 63 4.2 Biological and industrial organisms 64 4.3 Biological and industrial ecosystems 66 4.4 Engineering by biological and industrial organisms 69 4.5 Evolution 71 4.6 The utility of the ecological approach 73 Further Reading 75 Exercises 75 Chapter 5

Metabolic Analysis

77

5.1 The concept of metabolism 77 5.2 Metabolisms of biological organisms 77 5.3 Metabolisms of industrial organisms 79 5.4 The utility of metabolic analysis in industrial ecology 86 Further Reading 87 Exercises 88 Chapter 6 Technology and Risk

6.1 Historical patterns in technological evolution 89 6.2 Approaches to risk 93 6.3 Risk assessment 97

89

Contents

9

6.4 Risk communication 99 6.5 Risk management 100 Further Reading 102 Exercises 102 Chapter 7 The Social Dimensions of Industrial Ecology

104

7.1 Framing industrial ecology and sustainable engineering within society 104 7.2 Cultural constructs and temporal scales 105 7.3 Social ecology 108 7.4 Consumption 110 7.5 Government and governance 111 7.6 Legal and ethical concerns in industrial ecology 113 7.7 Economics and industrial ecology 115 7.7.1 The Private Firm 116 7.7.2 Valuation 116 7.7.3 Discount Rates 117 7.7.4 Green Accounting 118 7.8 Integrating the themes 119 Further Reading 121 Exercises 121 PART III

IMPLEMENTATION

Chapter 8

Sustainable Engineering

123 123

8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 8.5 8.6

Engineering and the industrial sequence 123 Green chemistry 125 Green engineering 127 The process design challenge 129 Pollution prevention 129 The process life cycle 132 8.6.1 Resource provisioning 132 8.6.2 Process implementation 133 8.6.3 Primary process operation 133 8.6.4 Complementary process operation 133 8.6.5 Refurbishment, recycling, disposal 134 8.7 Green technology and sustainability 134 Further Reading 136 Exercises 136

Chapter 9 Technological Product Development

| I

9.1 The product development challenge 137 9.2 Conceptual tools for product designers 139 9.2.1 The Pugh Selection Matrix 139 9.2.2 The House of quality 140

137

10

Contents

9.3 Design for X 140 9.4 Product design teams 143 9.5 The product realization process 144 Further Reading 147 Exercises 147 Chapter 10

Design for Environment and Sustainability: Customer Products

148

10.1 10.2 10.3 10.4 10.5 10.6

Introduction 148 Choosing materials 148 Combining materials 151 Product delivery 153 The product use phase 156 Design for reuse and recycling 157 10.6.1 The comet diagram 157 10.6.2 Approaches to design for recycling 159 10.6.3 Recycling complexities 160 10.7 Guidelines for DfES 165 Further Reading 166 Exercises 166 Chapter 11 Design for Environment and Sustainability: Buildings and Infrastructure

168

11.1 11.2 11.3 11.4 11.5 11.6 11.7

The (infra)structures of society 168 Electric power infrastructure 170 Water infrastructure 171 Transportation infrastructure 172 Telecommunications infrastructure 173 Green buildings 174 Infrastructure and building materials recycling 175 11.8 Green design guidelines 179 Further reading 180 Exercises 181 Chapter 12 An Introduction to Life Cycle Assessment

12.1 12.2 12.3 12.4

,

The concept of the life cycle 183 The LCA framework 184 Goal setting and scope determination 186 Defining boundaries 186 12.4.1 Level of detail boundaries 187 12.4.2 The natural ecosystem boundary 187 12.4.3 Boundaries in space and time 187 12.4.4 Choosing boundaries 189 12.5 Approaches to data acquisition 189

183

Contents

11

12.6 The life cycle of industrial products 192 12.7 The utility of life cycle inventory analysis 195 Further Reading 195 Exercises 196 Chapter 13 The LCA Impact and Interpretation Stages

197

13.1 LCA impact analysis 197 13.2 Interpretation 203 13.2.1 Identify significant issues in the results 203 13.2.2 Evaluate the data used in the LCA 204 13.2.3 Draw conclusions and recommendations 204 13.3 LCA software 204 13.4 Prioritizing recommendations 205 13.4.1 Approaches to prioritization 205 13.4.2 The action-agent prioritization diagram 207 13.4.3 The life-stage prioritization diagram 209 13.5 The limitations of life cycle assessment 210 Further Reading 211 Exercises 212 Chapter 14

Streamlining the LCA Process

213

14.1 14.2 14.3 14.4 14.5 14.6

Needs of the LCA user community 213 The assessment continuum 214 Preserving perspective while streamlining 215 The SLCA matrix 216 Target plots 217 Assessing generic automobiles of yesterday and today 219 14.7 Weighting in SLCA 223 14.8 SLCA assets and liabilities 229 14.9 The LCA/SLCA family 230 Further Reading 231 Exercises 232 PART IV

ANALYSIS OF TECHNOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

Chapter 15

Systems Analysis

15.1 15.2 15.3 15.4 15.5

The systems concept 233 The adaptive cycle 235 Holarchies 237 The phenomenon of emergent behavior 240 Adaptive management of technological holarchies 241 Further Reading 243 Exercises 244

233 233

12

Contents Chapter 16

Industrial Ecosystems

245

16.1 Ecosystems and food chains 245 16.2 Food webs 248 16.3 Industrial symbiosis 254 16.4 Designing and developing symbiotic industrial ecosystems 255 16.5 Uncovering and stimulating industrial ecosystems 257 16.6 Island biogeography and island industrogeography 258 Further Reading 259 Exercises 261 Chapter 17

Material Flow Analysis

262

17.1 Budgets and cycles 262 17.2 Resource analyses in industrial ecology 266 17.2.1 Elemental substance analyses 267 17.2.2 Molecular analyses 270 17.3 The balance between natural and anthropogenic mobilization of resources 271 17.4 The utility of material flow analysis 273 Further Reading 274 Exercises 274 Chapter 18

National Material Accounts

276

18.1 National-level accounting 276 18.2 Country-level metabolisms 277 18.3 Embodiments in trade 282 18.4 Resource productivity 283 18.5 Input-output tables 284 18.6 The utility of metabolic and resource analyses 289 Further Reading 289 Exercises 290 Chapter 19

Energy and Industrial Ecology

291

19.1 Energy and organisms 291 19.2 Energy and the product life cycle 295 19.3 The energy cycle for a substance 297 19.4 National and global energy analyses 299 19.5 Energy and mineral resources 300 19.6 Energy and industrial ecology 301 Further Reading 302 Exercises 302 Chapter 20 Water and Industrial Ecology

20.1 20.2 20.3 20.4

Water: An overview Water and organisms Water and products The water footprint

304 305 307 310

304

Contents

20.5 Water quality 312 20.6 Industrial ecology and water futures Further Reading 315 Exercises 315 Chapter 21

13

314

Urban Industrial Ecology

316

21.1 The city as organism 316 21.2 Urban metabolic flows 318 21.3 Urban metabolic stocks 319 21.4 Urban metabolic histories 321 21.5 Urban mining 323 21.6 Potential benefits of urban metabolic studies 324 Further Reading 325 Exercises 325 Chapter 22

Modeling in Industrial Ecology

326

22.1 What is an industrial ecology model? 326 22.2 Building the conceptual model 328 22.2.1 The Class 1 industrial ecology model 328 22.2.2 The Class 2 industrial ecology model 331 22.2.3 The Class 3 industrial ecology model 331 22.3 Running and evaluating industrial ecology models 332 22.3.1 Implementing the model 332 22.3.2 Model validation 332 22.4 Examples of industrial ecology models 333 22.5 The status of industrial ecology models 336 Further Reading 338 Exercises 340

PARTV THINKING AHEAD Chapter 23

Industrial Ecology Scenarios

341 341

23.1 What is an industrial ecology scenario? 341 23.2 Building the scenario 342 23.3 Examples of industrial ecology scenarios 343 23.4 The status of industrial ecology scenarios 347 Further Reading 348 Exercises 349 Chapter 24 The Status of Resources

24.1 24.2 24.3 24.4

Introduction 350 Mineral resources scarcity 351 Cumulative supply curves 355 Energy resources 357

350

X

Contents

24.5 Water resources 360 24.6 Summary 360 Further Reading 362 Exercises 362 Chapter 25

Industrial Ecology and Sustainable Engineering in Developing Economies

363

25.1 The three groupings 363 25.2 RDC/SDC dynamics and perspectives 365 25.3 Industrial ecology and sustainable engineering practice in LDCs 371 25.4 Thoughts on development in LDCs 372 Further Reading 373 Exercises 374 Chapter 26

Industrial Ecology and Sustainability in the Corporation

375

26.1 The manufacturing sector, industrial ecology, and sustainability 375 26.2 The service sector, industrial ecology, and sustainability 376 26.3 Environment and sustainability as strategic 380 26.4 The corporate economic benefits of environment and sustainability 381 26.5 Implementing industrial ecology in the corporation 382 Further Reading 385 Exercises 385 Chapter 27

Sustainable Engineering in Government and Society

387

27.1 Ecological engineering 387 27.2 Earth systems engineering and management 388 27.3 Regional scale ESEM: The Florida Everglades 389 27.4 Global scale ESEM: Stratospheric ozone and CFCs 391 27.5 Global scale ESEM: Combating global warming 392 27.5.1 Capturing Carbon dioxide 392 27.5.2 Sequestering Carbon in Vegetation 392 27.5.3 Sequestering Carbon in Marine Organisms 394 27.5.4 Scattering Solar Radiation with Sulfur Particles 394 27.5.5 Reflecting Solar Radiation with Mirrors in Space 395 27.5.6 Global Warming ESEM 396 27.6 The principles of ESEM 396 27.6.1 Theoretical principles of ESEM 397 27.6.2 Governance principles of ESEM 397 27.6.3 Design and engineering principles of ESEM 398 27.7 Facing the ESEM question 398 27.8 Proactive Industrial Ecology 399 Further Reading 401 Exercises 402

Contents Chapter 28

Looking to the Future

15 403

28.1 A status report 403 28.2 No simple answers 404 28.3 Foci for research 404 28.4 Themes and transitions 405 Further Reading 406 Exercise 406 Appendix

Units of Measurement in Industrial Ecology

407

Glossary

409

Index

419