Industrial ecology example

A larger scale example is the involvement of the cement industry in the growing field of industrial ecology. This takes the idea of an ecosystem with its many intersecting loops of materials and energy and applies it to industrial systems. Why use virgin raw materials and take them through a linear system to produce waste, when an imused material from one industry can be a feedstock for another ... 

Figure 13 shows an Australian example of industrial ecology. Sulfur dioxide is emitted from the metallurgical smelting of sulfide minerals at Mt. Isa in a remote area of Queensland. For many years, large quantities of SO2 had been emitted to the atmosphere. The development of phosphate rock mining at Phosphate Hill some 150 km away provided an opportunity to capture SO2 and convert it to sulfuric acid. The sulfuric acid could be used to digest the phosphate rock to make phosphoric acid. Ammonia manufacture from natural gas was possible, since natural gas from the Cooper Basin held in central... 

Figure 13 Queensland fertilizer project— an example of industrial ecology.

The energy sector of industrial ecosystems often suffers from a lack of robustness. Examples of energy vulnerability have become obvious with several energy crises during recent history. Another requirement of a healthy industrial ecology system that is vulnerable in some societies is water. In some regions of the world, both the... 

It is highly desirable, also from an ecological point of view, if wastes and materials that do not meet the specifications of nutrition are utilized industrially. These co- and by-products of food and feed production, processing and purification are often well accepted for industrial use. Examples in the area of meat production are wool, hides, bones and fats (e. g., - tallow), while plants may supply ->cotton linters, - straw from grain, - bagasse, - tocopherol and phytosterols (- steroids) from deodorizer distillate from edible oil refining. 

---