Empowering End-of-Life Vehicle Decision Making with Cross-Company Data Exchange and Data Sovereignty via Catena-X

Abstract

The mobility sector is the world’s second-largest producer of energy-related CO2 emissions, and it is facing a global resource shortage. The demand for circular products, the use of secondary materials in future vehicles, and the need for sustainable business models in the mobility sector is increasing. However, a transparent and end-to-end data exchange throughout the entire value network is missing, which is hindering an efficient circular economy. Relevant information on the vehicle, its components, and materials at the end of the product life cycle are often missing. In this context, this paper presents a decision support system based on Digital Twin data for a circular economy solution as a software application. It was developed within the German research project Catena-X following an integrated approach of user-centered design, the V-model, and within the Scaled Agile Framework. By combining these methodological approaches, customer-oriented solutions were developed and continuously improved at each stage of development to shorten the time-to-market. Catena-X is based on Gaia-X principles. In Gaia-X, necessary core services are developed, and contraction negotiation for data exchange and usage policies is enabled and implemented. The decision support system provides important information about the exact composition and condition of the vehicle, its components, and its materials. Thus, it helps to improve efficiency, sustainability, and the implementation of the circular economy. The decision support system was tested and validated with a use case that provided Digital Twin data on the end-of-life vehicle.

Digital Twins within the Circular Economy: Literature Review and Concept Presentation

“…The software is designed to provide relevant data about a vehicle along the PLC to support dismantlers at the EoL in deciding whether an EoL vehicle offers the potential for selling used components. The application was validated as part of a customer feedback study [33]. Kalaboukas et al utilize DT within the refrigerator supply chain to promote the selection of sustainable suppliers.…”

“…A DT for CE is intended to remedy this situation by acting as an enabler for CE, creating the necessary transparency throughout the PLC, and ensuring a closed loop at the product, component material, process, and information level. DTs support continuous data collection, analysis, and evaluation, providing this information to various stakeholders throughout the entire PLC [3,[14][15][16][17][19][20][21]23,24,27,29,[33][34][35]37]. As a result, new business models and services are emerging [3].…”

“…The relevant research states that at the EoL, the DT for CE can support EoL decision-making for the most appropriate strategy of reusing or remanufacturing parts or recycling materials by providing the necessary information about the current condition of the product as well as its history. For example, this information may include the remaining expected life of products, components, and materials [3,6,[12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20]22,24,25,27,29,30,[32][33][34]36,37]. Under optimal conditions, such as when the DT contains relevant information typically acquired through time-consuming manual inspections, the manual inspection process for asset conditions can be significantly expedited or even bypassed entirely [3].…”

“…Under optimal conditions, such as when the DT contains relevant information typically acquired through time-consuming manual inspections, the manual inspection process for asset conditions can be significantly expedited or even bypassed entirely [3]. Other tasks of DTs in this stage include reducing product complexity by providing information and improving the efficiency of disassembly processes, as well as supporting the virtual disassembly of products [14,15,30,32,33,35,37]. Furthermore, information on dismantling and recycling directives can be provided [35].…”

Supporting circular economy strategies for design of sustainable mechatronic systems using MBSE

“…End-of-Life (EoL) strategy selection frameworks have also been proposed in the literature (Alamerew and Brissaud, 2019). The approach from (Mügge et al, 2023), which is based on Digital Twin (DT) technology, facilitates information sharing among various stakeholders in the automotive industry, thereby enhancing EoL decision-making. A need for the evaluation of such strategies has also been identified in the literature.…”