A Review of the Wood Pellet Value Chain, Modern Value/Supply Chain Management Approaches, and Value/Supply Chain Models

Hughes, Natalie M.; Shahi, Chander; Pulkki, Reino

doi:10.1155/2014/654158

Cited by 18 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 123 publications

(138 reference statements)

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“…Community leaders viewed woody biomass from local sources as a benefit to the local economy since it supports forest industry activity, which has a long history in Atikokan [27], although some uncertainty exists related to Canadian woody biomass supply chains [77]. A provincially elected official was also quoted in the community newspaper, The Atikokan Progress, supporting the biomass scenario.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessment of potential local and regional induced economic impact of an energy policy change in rural Northwestern Ontario

et al. 2016

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Background: In 2002, the province of Ontario introduced plans to ban coal in thermoelectric power production. Rural communities with a high proportion of power plant jobs (such as Atikokan, Ontario, Canada) grappled with three potential outcomes of the planned changes. These include the following: (i) the coal ban is overturned and power plants continue to burn non-renewable coal, (ii) the coal ban takes effect and power plants are closed, and (iii) the coal ban takes effect but power plants continue operating with alternative renewable fuel sources such as woody biomass. Considering there is a lack of readily available economic assessment tools for Ontario communities, the objective of this study is to model how direct changes in employment at the power plant (and indirect employment at associated local industries) impact the spending patterns of households associated with the power plant. Methods: To address the objective, an induced economic impact assessment model was developed by integrating quantitative publically available data sources with community-level qualitative data sources incorporating them into an input-output approach. Baseline values were established, representing induced community expenditure under the coal scenario. Values were then adjusted to represent induced community expenditure under shutdown and biomass scenarios. Results: The model suggests that the continuation of coal would allow for $82.7M in household spending, the shutdown reduces overall household spending to $72.1M which represents a decrease of 12.8 %, and the conversion to woody biomass as the sole fuel for the power plant increases household spending relative to the coal by $1.2M or 1.4 %. The results also indicate that the induced economic impact would be realized throughout the region, beyond Atikokan. Conclusions: These results suggest that biomass conversion could produce a net positive-induced economic effect as household spending increases, provided local biomass fuel supply is available. Since a conversion to biomass from coal at this scale is a North American first, other jurisdictions may gain insight from this study as they consider reducing their environmental footprint. Furthermore, the induced economic impact model method which is presented here could easily be adapted and used for other Ontario communities which lack access to established input-output models.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessment of potential local and regional induced economic impact of an energy policy change in rural Northwestern Ontario

et al. 2016

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“…In a case study, Bildsten et al [62] show that value-driven purchasing of kitchen cabinets by an industrialized housing construction company could possibly lead to a reduction in the costs, complexity, and time associated with installation of bulk-purchased cabinets in the company's modularized production process. Hughes et al [83] considered modern supply chain management techniques and supply chain modeling, reviewing over 150 papers. However, only three papers addressed demand-driven modeling approaches to value/supply chains in the wood pellets sector.…”

Section: Greening Of the Supply Chainmentioning

confidence: 99%

Challenges and Opportunities for North American Hardwood Manufacturers to Adopt Customization Strategies in an Era of Increased Competition

Nicholls

Bumgardner

2018

Forests

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Much of the North American wood products industry was severely impacted by the recession of 2008-2009. In addition, many sectors within this industry face intense global competition. Against this backdrop, we examine economic opportunities for hardwood manufacturers to achieve greater competitive advantage via product customization, through a literature review and synthesis. We also discuss several related themes including agility, lean manufacturing, and clustering. We found that, in globally competitive environments, hardwood producers must be agile to adapt to economic conditions and dynamic customer demand. We discuss how some sectors of the hardwood industry have effectively exhibited customized production, and subsequently fared relatively well in the current economy. We conclude the synthesis by evaluating the importance of supply chains to achieving customization for hardwood producers. In the future, supply chains will need to be configured to rapidly respond to changing consumer demands, and pressure to provide more services will likely extend further back up the supply chain to hardwood sawmills. It is expected that sustainability practices, including green supply chain management, will impact operational and economic performance of hardwood firms as well.

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“…Since operation and logistic costs on factory and supply chain level are very important factors in their business processes, pellet fuel supply chains -if properly designed and operated -are lean in their supply chain management as well. This type of SCM is investigated by many publications, according to [6].…”

Section: Leanmentioning

confidence: 99%

Role of Lean and Agile Supply Chain Models for Pellet Fuel Technologies

Szendrei¹,

Kocsi²,

Budai³

et al. 2017

IJEMS

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Business organisations constantly strive to improve their processes, both internal and external. Within the supply chain of a product, different strategies can be applied. This paper aims to answer the basic questions like what is the core of lean and agile SCM strategies, what are the differences of the two models, and how can they be combined. This paper examines further, which of these SCM models and what elements of them can be applied for wood pellet supply chains, also examining the possibility of their combination. The result of these examinations is, that even though fuel pellets can be considered as simple commodity and not a very innovative product, diversity in input characteristics, optimization of fuel pellet technology process variables and changes in output market qualities and quantities need sometimes agile, flexible answer from pellet fuel SCM. The basically lean character of pellet fuel technologies and SCM can further enhanced by implementing agile SCM model elements, as is the increased integration of suppliers into the supply chain.

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A Review of the Wood Pellet Value Chain, Modern Value/Supply Chain Management Approaches, and Value/Supply Chain Models

Cited by 18 publications

References 123 publications

Assessment of potential local and regional induced economic impact of an energy policy change in rural Northwestern Ontario

Assessment of potential local and regional induced economic impact of an energy policy change in rural Northwestern Ontario

Challenges and Opportunities for North American Hardwood Manufacturers to Adopt Customization Strategies in an Era of Increased Competition

Role of Lean and Agile Supply Chain Models for Pellet Fuel Technologies

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