1,721,052 research outputs found
An innovative eco-intensity based method for assessing extended supply chain environmental sustainability
Full text linkOrganisations currently face increasing pressure from multiple stakeholders to improve their environmental performance. The majority of environmental impacts in a typical supply chain usually arise beyond the focal firm boundaries or even its direct suppliers. However, no method to assess the extended supply chain environmental performance that is designed to use real life data currently exists. The aim of this work is to facilitate quantitative assessment of the environmental performance of extended supply chains by introducing an innovative eco-intensity based method that relates the environmental performance of the supply chain to its economic output. The method is the first to allow assessing the environmental sustainability performance of extended supply chains based on real life data, while respecting the multiple-organisation nature and non-collaborative characteristics of the majority of real life supply chains. This is achieved through the adopted decentralised approach, materialised through a recursive mechanism to pass eco-intensity values from one tier to the next, which does not require visibility of the extended supply chain by any single member, thus enhancing the applicability of the method. The method is demonstrated through a numerical example with secondary data for four representative supply chains with different design features, to showcase its applicability. The CO2 emissions and water eco-intensities are calculated. The findings enable both benchmarking the eco-intensity performance of the extended supply chains and comparison of the eco-intensity indicators of the individual organisations, offering a basis to guide operational improvement and to support external reporting. The method has the potential to change the way organisations approach their environmental sustainability by facilitating understanding of the wider supply chain impact
Improving environmental sustainability in agri-food supply chains : evidence from an eco-intensity-based method application
Full text linkFocal companies in food supply chains face increasing pressure to produce food sustainably and lower the environmental impact across their supply chain (SC). Although governance mechanisms to manage suppliers and sub-suppliers have been established, focal companies in the food sector still lack effective tools to capture the actual environmental sustainability performance of their multi-tier SCs, which could support them to decrease the environmental impact associated to their products. This work thus aims to showcase how assessing the environmental sustainability performance of a multi-tier food SC made up by SMEs can support decisions in order to drive evidence-based green improvements in the SC operations. A low-input eco-intensity-based multicriteria performance assessment method was applied to a bread SC, adopting a longitudinal case study design, to evaluate its applicability for decision-making in an operating context. Following the identification of environmental hotspots along the SC, targeted green operational improvements were implemented within individual organisations, resulting in a decrease of the eco-intensity values both at the targeted SC tiers and at the overall SC level. These results demonstrated that the method was able to support the improvement of the SC environmental performance. This work is the first longitudinal study in the multi-tier green supply chain management (GSCM) area. It contributes to the multi-tier food GSCM and GSCM performance assessment fields by demonstrating how the integration of environmental sustainability performance assessment methods and SC governance mechanisms can effectively support across time the deployment of GSCM within food SCs, while adopting an indirect SC management approach. Finally, the application of the method within a supply chain consisting of SMEs, inexperienced in sustainability assessment, demonstrates its potential to achieve SC-wide sustainability assessment and contributes to the wider GSCM field by providing insights on the implementation of GSCM in supply chains dominated by SMEs
Towards circularity in the wind industry: Optimal reverse supply network design under various policy scenarios
Full text linkWind energy is key to supply renewable energy. However, the increasing number of end-of-life wind turbines is
still predominantly landfilled, while regulatory aspects such as waste shipment and landfilling rules hinder the
development and scalable implementation of reverse supply networks.
This work aims to understand how EU directives impact the structure and viability of circularity-enabling
networks by investigating the optimal reverse supply network design for end-of-life wind turbine blades under
different policy scenarios. Three policy scenarios were explored through a Mixed-Integer-Linear-Programming
model: (i) ‘as-is’; (ii) ‘EU Proposal 2021/0367′, removing transboundary restrictions on waste shipments; (iii)
‘Landfilling Ban’ enforcing an EU-wide ban on landfilling composites. The optimal reverse supply networks with
minimum costs were identified for each scenario, contextually determining location and sizing of recycling fa cilities and calculating landfilling quota and GHG emissions. The costs and emissions were minimum for the EU
Proposal scenario, at 15,706,041€ and 2,081 tCO2e respectively. A sensitivity analysis on landfilling gate fees
highlighted that they should be significantly increased to incentivise higher recycling rates and close material
loops.
This research is the first to evaluate the effects of policy initiatives on the shaping of optimised reverse supply
chains through mathematical programming methods. The work contributes to the waste management literature
by designing optimal circular supply chain networks for the management of waste from wind turbines decom missioning at the EU-level to improve sustainability of renewable energy installations
International vs. domestic bioenergy supply chains for co-firing plants : the role of pre-treatment technologies
Full text linkCo-firing of solid biomass in existing large scale coal power plants has been supported in many countries as a short-term means to decrease CO2 emissions and rapidly increase renewable energy shares. However, many countries face challenges guaranteeing sufficient amounts of biomass through reliable domestic biomass supply chains and resort to international supply chains. Within this frame, novel pre-treatment technologies, particularly pelletization and torrefaction, emerged in recent years to facilitate logistics by improving the durability and the energy density of solid biomass. This paper aims to evaluate these pre-treatment technologies from a techno-economic and environmental point of view for two reference coal power plants located in Great Britain and in Italy. Logistics costs and carbon emissions are modelled for both international and domestic biomass supply chains. The impact of pre-treatment technologies on carbon emission avoidance costs is evaluated. It is demonstrated that, for both cases, pre-treatment technologies are hardly viable for domestic supply. However, pre-treatment technologies are found to render most international bioenergy supply chains competitive with domestic ones, especially if sourcing areas are located in low labour cost countries. In many cases, pre-treatment technologies are found to guarantee similar CO2 equivalent emissions performance for international compared to domestic supply chain
Power in supply chain relationships : a comparative study between the Greek and the UK electricity sectors
No full textThis dissertation is concerned with the issue of power that exists between the two parties – the buyer and the seller – in any exchange relationship. Despite the fact that supply chain relationships have been analysed and researched very frequently by supply chain management and purchasing academics, little has been written on their power perspective. In this research, the Greek and the UK electricity industries are utilised as an empirical basis for the investigation of the unit of analysis, due to their inherent dynamics and the changes they have undergone the last years. With the use of a case study research strategy, it aspires to provide an insight to the power perspective of the supply chain relationships of the two cases, in order to fulfil its ultimate aim, which is to perform a comparison between the two electricity sectors in matters of power. The case formulation and the analysis are based primarily on data acquired through a series of interviews conducted in both Greek and UK electricity companies. The research undertaken includes a detailed review of the current literature on the unit of analysis, which indicates the lack of research in this field and justifies the necessity for conducting this work. The in-depth analysis of the supply chain relationships reveals the existence of vast differences in the relationship strategies and the attributes of power between the two countries. The cause of these differences is traced mainly to the different market conditions; nevertheless, these conditions are expected to converge in the near future. All the factors affecting positively or negatively the power position of electricity companies in Greece and UK are examined in great detail. Some of the major factors identified include state regulation and intervention, and asset specificity. This dissertation concludes with presenting recommendations for the Greek electricity industry, which are based on the experience of the UK situation
Assessing the sustainability of biomass supply chains for energy exploitation
No full textBiomass use has increased significantly lately, partly due to conventional fuels price increase. This trend is more evident in rural areas with significant local biomass availability. Biomass may be used in various ways to generate heat. In this work, the focus is on comparing two different biomass energy exploitation supply chains that provide heat at a specific number of customers at a specific cost. The first system is pellets production from biomass and distribution of the pellets to the final customers for use in domestic pellet boilers. The second option is centralized energy co-generation, which entails simultaneous electricity and heat generation. In the latter case, heat is distributed to the customers via a district heating network whereas electricity is fed to the electricity grid. The biomass source examined is locally available agricultural residues and the model is applied to a case study region in Greece. The aim of this work is to determine how these two different biomass exploitation options perform in sustainability terms, including the economic, environmental and social dimensions of sustainability. The effect of trying to optimise separately the economic and environmental dimensions of sustainability on the system design is examined, while at the same time taking into account the social dimension. Furthermore, a bi-objective optimisation is employed, to overcome the limitations of the single-objective optimisation. Both the upstream and the downstream supply chains of the pelletizing/CHP units are modelled
Biomass supply chains
No full textThe chapter discusses the biomass supply chain, which bears the role of supplying an energy conversion plant with biomass, at the correct quantity, time and quality specifications. The chapter first categorizes the biomass and waste streams and presents analytically the biomass supply chain, discussing its structure and characteristics. It then proceeds in reviewing the latest advances in biomass supply chains. The issue of integrating biomass energy conversion into waste management systems is tackled and the advantages and limitations of using biomass, in supply chain terms, are presented. The chapter concludes with future trends in biomass supply chain and logistics, and proposing sources of further informatio
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
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