Modeling and Optimization of Biomass Supply Chain for Energy, Chemicals and Materials Productions
| Author | : Abdul Halim Abdul Razik |
| Publisher | : |
| Total Pages | : 153 |
| Release | : 2016 |
| Genre | : |
| ISBN | : |
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In the growing concerns towards global environmental qualities and sustainable feedstocks supplies, scientific and technological efforts were intensified to utilize alternative renewable resources. In this regard, biomass appeared to be one of the potential feedstocks because it is generally carbon neutral and essentially renewable. Furthermore, biomass is virtually found in every part of the world in abundance and could provide socio-economic benefits. However, if it is not managed properly, biomass will be less competitive due to several issues that are associated with its supply chain. Typical biomass supply chain has a series of activities such as growing, harvesting, transporting, aggregating, and conversion which systematic and efficient flows of materials from the fields to the users are highly important. Biomass has competing uses, different kinds and origins which are potentially exploitable, poor geographic distributions for retrieving and transporting, and variations in physical and chemical properties. It is difficult to make informed decision for any biomass utilization project without having an optimal supply chain. This research intended to solve those issues by modeling and optimizing biomass supply chains for manufacturing energy, chemicals, and materials based on their respective processing routes. The aim was not only to focus on energy production from biomass but also to include chemicals and materials because of several factors such as an emerging cost competitive energy resource such as shale gas, highly volatile energy prices, and customer's preparedness and acceptances. Furthermore, it also could leverage biomass plantations on the producers' sides. The biomass supply chain model has considered annual profitability of producing products as the performance indicator. It was derived from revenues of selling the products subtracted all the associated costs such as biomass cost, transportation cost, production cost, and emission treatment costs from transportation and production activities. It summed up simultaneously all the profitable processing options that have existed in the superstructure to yield the optimal value, while a single ownership was assumed for the whole supply chain's facilities. Three optimization models have been developed and implemented in GAMS (General Algebraic Modeling System).
