Records |
Author |
Buyle, M.; Maes, B.; Van Passel, S.; Boonen, K.; Vercalsteren, A.; Audenaert, A. |
Title |
Ex-ante LCA of emerging carbon steel slag treatment technologies : fast forwarding lab observations to industrial-scale production |
Type |
A1 Journal article |
Year |
2021 |
Publication |
Journal Of Cleaner Production |
Abbreviated Journal |
J Clean Prod |
Volume |
313 |
Issue |
|
Pages ![sorted by First Page field, descending order (down)](img/sort_desc.gif) |
127921 |
Keywords |
A1 Journal article; Engineering sciences. Technology; Energy and Materials in Infrastructure and Buildings (EMIB) |
Abstract |
The valuable properties of carbon steel slag are currently underexploited. To date, research mainly focusses on valorising a single property of the slag. In this study an ex-ante life cycle assessment (LCA) was applied to evaluate the environmental profile of a novel technological pathway aimed at the extraction of chromium from carbon steel slag in combination with high quality valorisation of the residual matrix material. A comparison with current practice was made, not only by calculating the environmental impact of the lab scale observations, but more importantly by estimating the impact on an industrial scale. Practical guidance on ex-ante LCA is limited, so this study contributes by incorporating simulations on thermodynamic behaviour, complemented with empirical calculation rules and including information derived from similar technologies to perform the upscaling. These principles of ex-ante LCA were applied to the lab results of two consecutive research iterations. Substantial improvements of the environmental profile were observed: ex-ante results turned out to be a factor 20 lower compared to the results from the lab observations after the first iteration and had decreased by a factor 2 compared to the small pilot scale of the second iteration. All upscaled results are better than those from the worst case reference scenario (landfill). Based on the experience gained after this iterative research cycle, a practical recommendation is that at a low technology readiness level using more simple calculation rules in combination with a flowsheet based on elementary design principles for processes at an industrial scale is a more efficient way of modelling compared to a fully-fledged process design from the start. |
Address |
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Corporate Author |
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Thesis |
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Publisher |
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Place of Publication |
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Editor |
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Language |
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Wos |
000693416000002 |
Publication Date |
2021-06-14 |
Series Editor |
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Series Title |
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Abbreviated Series Title |
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Series Volume |
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Series Issue |
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Edition |
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ISSN |
0959-6526 |
ISBN |
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Additional Links |
UA library record; WoS full record |
Impact Factor |
5.715 |
Times cited |
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Open Access |
Not_Open_Access |
Notes |
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Approved |
Most recent IF: 5.715 |
Call Number |
UA @ admin @ c:irua:179313 |
Serial |
6922 |
Permanent link to this record |
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Author |
Christis, M.; Geerken, T.; Vercalsteren, A.; Vrancken, K.C.M. |
Title |
Value in sustainable materials management strategies for open economies case of Flanders (Belgium) |
Type |
A1 Journal article |
Year |
2015 |
Publication |
Resources, conservation and recycling |
Abbreviated Journal |
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Volume |
103 |
Issue |
|
Pages ![sorted by First Page field, descending order (down)](img/sort_desc.gif) |
110-124 |
Keywords |
A1 Journal article; Sustainable Energy, Air and Water Technology (DuEL) |
Abstract |
Sustainable Materials Management (SMM) strategies, such as reuse, recycling and energy recovery aim, to capture more of the embedded resource or material value in products and waste streams. Reuse, recycling and energy recovery are existing activities in every society but they are poorly reflected in official statistics. Reaching higher levels of reuse, recycling and energy recovery may provide economic and environmental opportunities (i.e., in terms of GDP, jobs, reduced impacts), but not all options will have a net win-win-win property in practice, as they reduce the need for producing new commodities. In open economies, many primary resources, components and products are imported from abroad, and many goods produced are exported abroad. This paper describes a top-down methodology for estimating the substitution potential of intensifying specific SMM-strategies and material efficiency strategies. We combined both regional and multi-regional EE-IO (environmentally extended input-output) models to link industrial sectors to SMM-strategies. Our method enables us to compare the different SMM and material efficiency strategies in terms of the maximum available budgets for reaching them on a break even basis, maximum savings in global warming emissions and substituted employment effects, both through a regional and global perspective. We add a case on Flanders (Northern region in Belgium) to illustrate the methodology. Flanders is currently developing a policy for SMM. Selecting new regional actions for a Sustainable Materials Management policy can benefit from a good understanding of the international entangled value chains. It is important to understand how much of the chain is within reach of domestic policies and also to assess the consequences in terms of potential winners and losers, regarding GDP, jobs and environmental impacts, both domestically and abroad. We illustrated the potential outcomes for Flanders from four generic SMM-strategies: energy recovery, food waste prevention, recycling and reuse. From a strict regional self-interest perspective, it is preferable to substitute foreign value chains with local economic activities. Reuse creates by far the largest budget for new activities to realize the strategy (31.2% of Flemish GDP compared to 8.3% for food waste prevention, 6.2% for energy recovery and 4.2% for recycling). All four strategies have similar and significant potentials to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, food waste prevention and reuse have higher potentials to reduce Flemish territorial GHG-emissions. From a pure Flemish employment perspective, the energy recovery and recycling strategies could replace the fewest Flemish jobs, and from a global perspective, all strategies most likely imply losses of jobs abroad. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. |
Address |
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Corporate Author |
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Thesis |
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Publisher |
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Place of Publication |
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Editor |
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Language |
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Wos |
000362618600011 |
Publication Date |
2015-08-22 |
Series Editor |
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Series Title |
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Abbreviated Series Title |
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Series Volume |
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Series Issue |
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Edition |
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ISSN |
0921-3449 |
ISBN |
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Additional Links |
UA library record; WoS full record; WoS citing articles |
Impact Factor |
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Times cited |
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Open Access |
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Notes |
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Approved |
no |
Call Number |
UA @ admin @ c:irua:128777 |
Serial |
8732 |
Permanent link to this record |
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Author |
Christis, M.; Geerken, T.; Vercalsteren, A.; Vrancken, K.C.M. |
Title |
Improving footprint calculations of small open economies : combining local with multi-regional input-output tables |
Type |
A1 Journal article |
Year |
2017 |
Publication |
Economic systems research |
Abbreviated Journal |
|
Volume |
29 |
Issue |
1 |
Pages ![sorted by First Page field, descending order (down)](img/sort_desc.gif) |
25-47 |
Keywords |
A1 Journal article; Economics; Sustainable Energy, Air and Water Technology (DuEL) |
Abstract |
In a small, open and resource-poor economy, import and export dependency have an ever-growing impact on local policy decisions, which makes local (environmental) policy-makers increasingly depend on global data. This increases the interest in models that link local production and consumption data to global production, trade and environmental data. The recent increase in availability of global environmentally extended multi-regional input-output tables (EE-MRIO tables) provides an opportunity to link them with existing local environmentally extended input-output tables (EE-RIO tables). These combined tables make it possible (1) to analyse the links between local and global production and consumption and (2) to study global value chains, material use and environmental impacts simultaneously. However, estimations using input-output (I-O) analyses contain errors due to imperfect databases. In this article the magnitude of specification, aggregation and time errors are estimated and compared. The results show the need to combine local datasets with multi-regional ones and show that highest detailed (country and sector levels) as well as time series of I-O tables are the way forward for using I-O analyses in local policy-making. The paper provides guidance on trading off investments in model adoption and/or extension and the reliability of estimation results. |
Address |
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Corporate Author |
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Thesis |
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Publisher |
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Place of Publication |
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Editor |
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Language |
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Wos |
000395062800002 |
Publication Date |
2016-11-01 |
Series Editor |
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Series Title |
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Abbreviated Series Title |
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Series Volume |
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Series Issue |
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Edition |
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ISSN |
0953-5314 |
ISBN |
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Additional Links |
UA library record; WoS full record; WoS citing articles |
Impact Factor |
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Times cited |
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Open Access |
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Notes |
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Approved |
no |
Call Number |
UA @ admin @ c:irua:142012 |
Serial |
8071 |
Permanent link to this record |