IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/appene/v218y2018icp232-245.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Control data, Sankey diagrams, and exergy: Assessing the resource efficiency of industrial plants

Author

Listed:
  • Gonzalez Hernandez, Ana
  • Lupton, Richard C.
  • Williams, Chris
  • Cullen, Jonathan M.

Abstract

Studies analysing the resource use of industrial production are often performed at highly aggregated levels, e.g. yearly across industry sectors. Conversely, the remit of work performed at the operational level is limited to the management of energy or concerned with aspects such as safety or reliability, both of which fail to consider material efficiency options at that scale. This gap is filled by applying the concept of exergy to the disaggregated time-scales and scopes typical of real-time operations. Our tool measures the resource efficiency of processes and visually traces the use of both energy and materials from available control data. This is exemplified through the case study of a Tata Steel basic oxygen steelmaking plant, where resource flows are visualised using Sankey diagrams. An analysis of the resource efficiency variations across batches and days for a period of 29 days – over 900 batches – show the plant’s inefficiencies primarily arise from the converter process, the resource efficiency of which varies from 87.4% to 93.7%. By recovering material and energy by-products, and reducing fuel inputs we estimate that 7% of the total exergy input can be saved or further utilised. About 60% of these improvements arise from energy-related measures. The remaining 40% emanates from reductions in material use, a contribution which would be missed if using conventional energy metrics. This approach makes three contributions. First, it gives industry a single metric of resource efficiency that can jointly measure the system-level performance of material and energy transformations. Second, it provides a new picture of the plant’s operational resource use. Third, it allows managers to have more detailed information on resource flows and thus helps place material-efficiency improvements on an equal footing to energy efficiency. This, therefore, provides a clearer picture of where interventions can deliver the greatest efficiency gains.

Suggested Citation

  • Gonzalez Hernandez, Ana & Lupton, Richard C. & Williams, Chris & Cullen, Jonathan M., 2018. "Control data, Sankey diagrams, and exergy: Assessing the resource efficiency of industrial plants," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 218(C), pages 232-245.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:218:y:2018:i:c:p:232-245
    DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2018.02.181
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306261918303155
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.apenergy.2018.02.181?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nina Eisenmenger & Benjamin Warr & Andreas Magerl, 2017. "Trends in Austrian Resource Efficiency: An Exergy and Useful Work Analysis in Comparison to Material Use, CO 2 Emissions, and Land Use," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 21(5), pages 1250-1261, October.
    2. Soundararajan, Kamal & Ho, Hiang Kwee & Su, Bin, 2014. "Sankey diagram framework for energy and exergy flows," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 1035-1042.
    3. Wall, Göran, 1988. "Exergy flows in industrial processes," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 197-208.
    4. Costa, Márcio Macedo & Schaeffer, Roberto & Worrell, Ernst, 2001. "Exergy accounting of energy and materials flows in steel production systems," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 363-384.
    5. Magnus Fröhling & Frank Schwaderer & Hauke Bartusch & Frank Schultmann, 2013. "A Material Flow‐based Approach to Enhance Resource Efficiency in Production and Recycling Networks," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 17(1), pages 5-19, February.
    6. Wu, Junnian & Wang, Ruiqi & Pu, Guangying & Qi, Hang, 2016. "Integrated assessment of exergy, energy and carbon dioxide emissions in an iron and steel industrial network," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 430-444.
    7. Zhang, Qi & Xu, Jin & Wang, Yujie & Hasanbeigi, Ali & Zhang, Wei & Lu, Hongyou & Arens, Marlene, 2018. "Comprehensive assessment of energy conservation and CO2 emissions mitigation in China’s iron and steel industry based on dynamic material flows," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 209(C), pages 251-265.
    8. Flórez-Orrego, Daniel & de Oliveira Junior, Silvio, 2016. "On the efficiency, exergy costs and CO2 emission cost allocation for an integrated syngas and ammonia production plant," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 117(P2), pages 341-360.
    9. Morris, David R. & Szargut, Jan, 1986. "Standard chemical exergy of some elements and compounds on the planet earth," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 11(8), pages 733-755.
    10. Porzio, Giacomo Filippo & Fornai, Barbara & Amato, Alessandro & Matarese, Nicola & Vannucci, Marco & Chiappelli, Lisa & Colla, Valentina, 2013. "Reducing the energy consumption and CO2 emissions of energy intensive industries through decision support systems – An example of application to the steel industry," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 818-833.
    11. Robert U. Ayres & Leslie W. Ayres, 1999. "Accounting for Resources, 2," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 1621.
    12. Nakićenović, Nebojsa & Gilli, Paul Viktor & Kurz, Rainer, 1996. "Regional and global exergy and energy efficiencies," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 223-237.
    13. Matino, Ismael & Colla, Valentina & Baragiola, Stefano, 2017. "Quantification of energy and environmental impacts in uncommon electric steelmaking scenarios to improve process sustainability," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 207(C), pages 543-552.
    14. Karali, Nihan & Park, Won Young & McNeil, Michael, 2017. "Modeling technological change and its impact on energy savings in the U.S. iron and steel sector," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 202(C), pages 447-458.
    15. Bühler, Fabian & Nguyen, Tuong-Van & Elmegaard, Brian, 2016. "Energy and exergy analyses of the Danish industry sector," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 184(C), pages 1447-1459.
    16. Bisio, G., 1993. "Exergy method for efficient energy resource use in the steel industry," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 18(9), pages 971-985.
    17. Allwood, Julian M. & Ashby, Michael F. & Gutowski, Timothy G. & Worrell, Ernst, 2011. "Material efficiency: A white paper," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 55(3), pages 362-381.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sun, Jingchao & Na, Hongming & Yan, Tianyi & Che, Zichang & Qiu, Ziyang & Yuan, Yuxing & Li, Yingnan & Du, Tao & Song, Yanli & Fang, Xin, 2022. "Cost-benefit assessment of manufacturing system using comprehensive value flow analysis," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 310(C).
    2. Sun, Jingchao & Na, Hongming & Yan, Tianyi & Qiu, Ziyang & Yuan, Yuxing & He, Jianfei & Li, Yingnan & Wang, Yisong & Du, Tao, 2021. "A comprehensive assessment on material, exergy and emission networks for the integrated iron and steel industry," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 235(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Charalampos Michalakakis & Jeremy Fouillou & Richard C. Lupton & Ana Gonzalez Hernandez & Jonathan M. Cullen, 2021. "Calculating the chemical exergy of materials," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 25(2), pages 274-287, April.
    2. Wu, Junnian & Pu, Guangying & Guo, Yan & Lv, Jingwen & Shang, Jiangwei, 2018. "Retrospective and prospective assessment of exergy, life cycle carbon emissions, and water footprint for coking network evolution in China," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 218(C), pages 479-493.
    3. Wu, Junnian & Wang, Ruiqi & Pu, Guangying & Qi, Hang, 2016. "Integrated assessment of exergy, energy and carbon dioxide emissions in an iron and steel industrial network," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 430-444.
    4. Zheng, Danxing & Wu, Zhaohui & Huang, Weijia & Chen, Youhui, 2017. "Energy quality factor of materials conversion and energy quality reference system," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 185(P1), pages 768-778.
    5. Qi, Hai & Dong, Zhiliang & Dong, Shaohui & Sun, Xiaotian & Zhao, Yiran & Li, Yu, 2021. "Extended exergy accounting for smelting and pressing of metals industry in China," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    6. BoroumandJazi, G. & Rismanchi, B. & Saidur, R., 2013. "A review on exergy analysis of industrial sector," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 198-203.
    7. Skoczkowski, Tadeusz & Verdolini, Elena & Bielecki, Sławomir & Kochański, Max & Korczak, Katarzyna & Węglarz, Arkadiusz, 2020. "Technology innovation system analysis of decarbonisation options in the EU steel industry," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 212(C).
    8. Jadhao, Sachin B. & Pandit, Aniruddha B. & Bakshi, Bhavik R., 2017. "The evolving metabolism of a developing economy: India’s exergy flows over four decades," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 206(C), pages 851-857.
    9. Charalampos Michalakakis & Jonathan M. Cullen, 2022. "Dynamic exergy analysis: From industrial data to exergy flows," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 26(1), pages 12-26, February.
    10. Zhang, Bo & Chen, G.Q. & Xia, X.H. & Li, S.C. & Chen, Z.M. & Ji, Xi, 2012. "Environmental emissions by Chinese industry: Exergy-based unifying assessment," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 490-501.
    11. Utlu, Zafer & Hepbasli, Arif, 2007. "A review and assessment of the energy utilization efficiency in the Turkish industrial sector using energy and exergy analysis method," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 11(7), pages 1438-1459, September.
    12. Na, Hongming & Sun, Jingchao & Qiu, Ziyang & He, Jianfei & Yuan, Yuxing & Yan, Tianyi & Du, Tao, 2021. "A novel evaluation method for energy efficiency of process industry — A case study of typical iron and steel manufacturing process," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    13. Chen, B. & Chen, G.Q., 2006. "Exergy analysis for resource conversion of the Chinese Society 1993 under the material product system," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 31(8), pages 1115-1150.
    14. Ojeda, Karina & Sánchez, Eduardo & Kafarov, Viatcheslav, 2011. "Sustainable ethanol production from lignocellulosic biomass – Application of exergy analysis," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 36(4), pages 2119-2128.
    15. Matino, Ismael & Dettori, Stefano & Colla, Valentina & Weber, Valentine & Salame, Sahar, 2019. "Forecasting blast furnace gas production and demand through echo state neural network-based models: Pave the way to off-gas optimized management," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 253(C), pages 1-1.
    16. Nguyen, Tuong-Van & Fülöp, Tamás Gábor & Breuhaus, Peter & Elmegaard, Brian, 2014. "Life performance of oil and gas platforms: Site integration and thermodynamic evaluation," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 282-301.
    17. Zhang, Bo & Chen, G.Q., 2010. "Physical sustainability assessment for the China society: Exergy-based systems account for resources use and environmental emissions," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 14(6), pages 1527-1545, August.
    18. Honghua Yang & Linwei Ma & Zheng Li, 2020. "A Method for Analyzing Energy-Related Carbon Emissions and the Structural Changes: A Case Study of China from 2005 to 2015," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(8), pages 1-24, April.
    19. Nguyen, Tuong-Van & Pierobon, Leonardo & Elmegaard, Brian & Haglind, Fredrik & Breuhaus, Peter & Voldsund, Mari, 2013. "Exergetic assessment of energy systems on North Sea oil and gas platforms," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 23-36.
    20. Utlu, Zafer & Hepbasli, Arif, 2007. "A review on analyzing and evaluating the energy utilization efficiency of countries," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 1-29, January.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:218:y:2018:i:c:p:232-245. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.