Sustainable juice evaporation unit selection for noncentrifugal sugar production by multicriteria evaluation methods

Abstract

AbstractIn the conventional practice of producing noncentrifugal sugar (NCS), many technologies are available for juice evaporation, all of which may not be sustainable. The sustainability of these units is dependent on multiple criteria belonging to resources, technical, economic, process‐output, and environmental parameters. This paper presents the work undertaken to identify the most sustainable juice evaporation unit (to produce NCS) among 10 alternatives using three multicriteria evaluation (MCE) techniques, namely TOPSIS, PROMETHEE II, and VIKOR. The analyses were based on 11 evaluation criteria covering four sustainability elements. Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and entropy weight approaches were used to assess the importance of each criterion for the ranking of evaporation units. The necessary data were obtained from three different decision‐maker groups, namely academics and sustainability promoters, NCS manufacturers, and NCS plant suppliers. The resulting criteria weights indicate that capital cost (with AHP analysis based weights as 16.81, 12.51, 15.30% for decision‐makers groups I, II, III, and a weight of 23.28% from entropy method) is found to be the most crucial criterion. With assessment values of 0.741, 0.186, and 0.048 in TOPSIS, PROMETHEE II, and VIKOR, respectively, “single pan with the improved furnace” emerged to be the most sustainable option. This result is also substantiated by a group priority index of 1.08 obtained through the geometric mean method of analysis. This suggests that “single pan with the improved furnace” is the most sustainable one for NCS production. Furthermore, sensitivity analyses undertaken indicate that “single pan with the improved furnace” is most and least sensitive to “greenhouse emissions” and “process time,” respectively. With these outcomes, this paper demonstrates that the methodology adopted herein could be considered for assessing the sustainability of other process units involved in NCS production.Practical ApplicationsIn the conventional practice of producing NCS, there are various technologies available for the evaporation of juice. This paper narrates the MCE‐based work to identify a sustainable juice evaporation unit. It can be suggested that the most sustainable unit is “single pan with improved furnace” and the least sustainable is “multi‐effect evaporator.” The results of the present analysis suggested that the use of the other nine units for the production of NCS is to be subjected to thorough scrutiny, specifically regarding their sustainability. The methodology taken up for this analysis could be extended for other subprocesses in the NCS production process line to get the most sustainable process line.