Sustainable Assessment

Lapkin, A. (2006) In Renewables-Based Technology Sustainability Assessment (eds. J. Dewulf 8c I.H.v. Langenhove). lohn WUey St Sons, New York, pp. 39-53. 

Brent AC, Rogers DE. Renewable rural electrification Sustainability assessment of mini-hybrid off-grid technological systems in the African context. Renewable Energy. 2010 35(1) 257-265. DOLIO. 1016/j. renene. 2009. 03. 028. 

The starting point in the development and designing of a closed water loop system is an inventory of the amounts and the quality of the process and transport water flows which are needed for the various steps in the production process. Each production step where process or transport water is involved causes a certain amount of wastewater. The pollution of this water is strongly dependent on the process step. The selection of separate treatment steps which, together, comprise a closed loop water system is complex. As already mentioned, various complete treatment scenarios can be developed and designed to satisfy the requirements set for process and transport water and treatment of wastewater. A technical and economic evaluation, in combination with environmental sustainability assessment, is necessary to determine the treatment system which is most appropriate. 

Renewables-based Technology - Sustainability Assessment J. Dewulf... 

Depending on the aim of the study, appropriate life-cycle methods and scope have to be chosen [27]. Most of the methods either consider all stages of the ENM or nanoproduct life-cycle, or focus only on specific parts of the life-cycle. For example, some methods focus only on the environmental health effects of ENMs, whereas life-cycle assessment (LCA) focuses on all environmental impacts of a nanoproduct, and thus also includes considerations such as impacts of energy consumption. LCA is essentially a comprehensive tool for environmental sustainability assessment. 

The LCA results can be used for a sustainability assessment of a new technology by comparing the outcome with the existing technology results. In the conceptual phase of the new technology, a relative assessment can be used to highlight where improvements should be made and where the problem areas are. This is shown in Section 3 on process intensification assessment. 

For the sustainability assessment of HE system a following indicators are used ... 

Naim H. Afgan, Maria G. Carvalho, Sustainability Assessment Method for Energy Systems, Kluwer Academic, Boston, 2000... 

Afgan NH, da Grafa Carvalho M (2004). Sustainability assessment of hydrogen energy systems. International Journal of Hydrogen Energy 29 1327-1342... 

Such considerations increase the time and cost of evaluation and conflict with commercial opportunism in seizing perceived market opportunities, but are valuable in assessing and understanding risk and are essential to sustainability assessment. 

We have discussed a series of examples and aspects, such as the problem of risk and sustainability assessment, tools and principles for a sustainable industrial development (in particular, the issue of scaling-down and intensification of chemical processes, and the role of catalysis), and problems and opportunities in substituting chemical and processes (also in the view of REACH legislation, and of the international chemicals policy on sustainability). These topics are expanded in the following chapters, while the final section on industrial case histories for sustainable chemical processes provides further hints on these aspects. 

Sustainability assessment requires a case-specific combination of tools, methods, and data around ecological, economic, and social chances and risks. 

Since an assessment on the level of the material is not complete, an assessment on the level of products is required, which covers all life cycle phases, i.e. production, use and end-of-Ufe. Such a Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCS) should be the core of an assessment, while it has to be completed by a variety of other tools, which address e.g. compliance with local emission limits and consumer protection regulations. Legal compliance requires other efforts than an overall sustainability assessment. Since compliance is an issue companies have to... 

Life cycle modeling and sustainability assessment support companies in the following areas ... 

While the sustainability assessment of products requires a consistent approach independently of which materials the products are made, polymers require special attention in some issues. These wiU briefly be tackled in the next section before moving to the generally required approach. 

Fig. 15 Data collection on level of the unit process for complete Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment...

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