Multi-method and Multi-scale Analysis of Energy and Resource Conversion and Use

Ulgiati, Sérgio; Ascione, Marco; Bargigli, Silvia; Cherubini, Francesco; Federici, Mirco; Franzese, Pier Paolo; Raugei, Marco; Viglia, Silvio; Zucaro, Amalia

doi:10.1007/978-90-481-9565-7_1

Cited by 19 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…16 Metabolic efficiency represents the ratio of outputs to inputs, where "output" represents the quantity or value of the products or services from an urban system and "input" represents the environmental load created by the consumption of resources and energy, such as water consumption and the resulting waste emission. Researchers have used the concept of metabolic efficiency to study cities such as Taipei, 31 Shenzhen, 32 Shanghai, 33 Limerick, 34 Rome, 35 and Beijing. 36 Other researchers have analyzed the relationships between metabolic efficiency and human well-being.…”

Section: History and Evolution Of The Urban Metabolism Conceptmentioning

confidence: 99%

Urban Metabolism: A Review of Current Knowledge and Directions for Future Study

Zhang

Yang

Yu³

2015

Environ. Sci. Technol.

122

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During the 50 years since the concept of urban metabolism was proposed, this field of research has evolved slowly. On the basis of an analogy with an organism's metabolism, the concept of urban metabolism has become an effective method to evaluate the flows of energy and materials within an urban system, thereby providing insights into the system's sustainability and the severity of urban problems such as excessive social, community, and household metabolism at scales ranging from global to local. Researchers have improved this approach, evolving from models of linear to cyclic processes and then to network models. Researchers account for flows of energy and materials, ecological footprints, inputs and outputs, and the characteristics of the system's ecological network. However, the practical methods of analysis need to be improved. Future analysis should focus on establishing a multilevel, unified, and standardized system of categories to support the creation of consistent inventory databases; it should also seek to improve the methods used in the analysis to provide standards and guidance that will help governments to achieve sustainable development. Finally, researchers must improve the ability to provide spatially explicit analyses that facilitate the task of applying research results to guide practical decision-support.

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Section: History and Evolution Of The Urban Metabolism Conceptmentioning

confidence: 99%

Urban Metabolism: A Review of Current Knowledge and Directions for Future Study

Zhang

Yang

Yu³

2015

Environ. Sci. Technol.

122

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“…Because of the complexity of socio-ecological systems, optimizing the performance of a given process requires that many different aspects are taken into account to provide a synthetic answer to the complex and multifaceted problem of environmental impact [12]. More specifically, resource management and the minimization of the environmental impacts of energy production are becoming an issue of great significance towards the development of sustainable technologies [13,14].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The LCA-based evaluation of energetic flows and resource exploitation is essential for improving the environmental management of natural stocks and their use [29]. The ELCA should be complemented with problem-oriented (midpoint) impact categories (e.g., global warming, ozone layer depletion, eutrophication, and acidification) and damage-oriented (as damage to human health, ecosystem quality or resources) for a holistic environmental appraisal [12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exergetic, environmental and economic sustainability assessment of stationary Molten Carbonate Fuel Cells

Mehmeti

Pérez-Trujillo

Elizalde‐Blancas

et al. 2018

Energy Conversion and Management

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In this study, exergetic, environmental and economic (3E) analyses have been performed in order to provide sustainability indicators from resource extraction to the final product of stationary power Molten Carbonate Fuel Cells (MCFC) systems (500 kW). Two environmental life cycle impact assessment methods have been selected: the ReCiPe 2016 hierarchical midpoint and endpoint, and the Cumulative Exergy Extraction from the Natural Environment (CEENE). A cost-benefit model is adopted to calculate the economic sustainability using the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) under different sensitivity parameters. The global warming potential (GWP) is estimated to be 0.549 kg CO2-eq/kWh while acidification (5.06e-4 kg SO2-eq/kWh), eutrophication (9.81e-4 kg Peq. freshwater/kWh), ozone layer depletion (4.11e-6 kg CFC-11-eq/kWh) and human toxicity (1.07 kg 1,4-DB-eq/kWh). Aggregated CEENE was estimated to be about 8.55 MJex/kWh. Results show that majority of impacts are dominated by fuel supply, while some others are dominated by manufacturing of system. GWP is the only impact category dominated by system operation. Due to potentially high electrical efficiency, MCFC energy systems can lead to lower CEENE and improvements of global warming, fossil fuel and resource scarcity, and photochemical oxidant formation potential with respect to other conventional energy conversion systems. Advances in longer lifetimes of the MCFC stack can help trigger innovation in manufacturing processes and will lead to less resource use of electricity, metal, and minerals, thus less resource scarcity and toxicity related burdens. The baseline LCOE is calculated 0.1265 €/kWh being comparable with the Italian grid (0.15-0.16 €/kWh). The costing results indicate that the unit decreasing the system capital cost could potentially reduce the LCOE by around 25%. Advancing the use of life-cycle thinking in MCFC industry with site-specific data raise systems credibility and enables clarifying the trade-offs between the sustainability pillars, thus designing more sustainable products.

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“…Rugani and Benedetto (2012) stressed that the LCA is more focused on downstream impacts and does not account for human labor and ecosystem services. Other studies tried to face these limitations by integrating LCA with Emergy accounting (Buonocore et al, 2019;Reza et al, 2014;Skaf et al, 2019;Ulgiati et al, 2010;Viglia et al, 2013). Girardet (1990) proposed a cyclical urban metabolic model to overcome the limitations of the linear carbon metabolism approach not capable of accounting for the negative feedback of human impacts on natural ecosystems and their ability to provide ecosystem services such as, for instance, carbon sequestration.…”

Section: Linear Accounting Modelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the global scientific literature on urban metabolism

Galychyn

Buonocore

Franzese

2020

Self Cite

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Urban ecosystems can be conceptualized like living organisms supported by material and energy flows that allow the generation of ecosystem structures and functions and the production of goods and services. Urban metabolism accounts for the flows of materials, energy, resources, food, and people in cities, providing a framework for the study of the interactions between natural and socioeconomic systems. In this paper, the global scientific literature on urban metabolism was explored to identify knowledge gaps and emerging research areas over the last decades. A bibliometric network analysis was implemented to generate maps based on network data of scientific publications displaying relationships among scientific journals, researchers, countries, and keywords. The total number of publications on urban metabolism from 1990 to 2019 resulted in 498 documents. USA and China resulted the first countries publishing on urban metabolism while among the journals, the Journal of Industrial Ecology and Journal of Cleaner Production resulted the first in the ranking. The co-occurrence network map of keywords showed that, over the last decade, the main focus of research on urban metabolism has shifted from environmental issues to environmental accounting and socioeconomic aspects. Considering the importance of urban systems for the achievement of local and global sustainability goals, it is likely that the scientific literature on urban metabolism will continue growing over the next years. Being cities characterized by complex relationships between natural and socioeconomic systems, it is desirable that future studies will explore the multidimensional features of urban metabolism through multi-criteria assessment frameworks.

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Multi-method and Multi-scale Analysis of Energy and Resource Conversion and Use

Cited by 19 publications

References 19 publications

Urban Metabolism: A Review of Current Knowledge and Directions for Future Study

Urban Metabolism: A Review of Current Knowledge and Directions for Future Study

Exergetic, environmental and economic sustainability assessment of stationary Molten Carbonate Fuel Cells

Exploring the global scientific literature on urban metabolism

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