Eco-industrial Parks Research Articles

Public Agency in Changing Industrial Circular Economy Ecosystems: Roles, Modes and Structures

Value creation in the circular economy (CE) is a result of co-creation. In the industrial context, the theme of collaboration has been studied extensively on a company-to-company basis, but related public agency remains unexplored. Still, circular actions happen in societal contexts where public actors and logics are constantly present, enabling the change toward more sustainable actions. For systematic discovery of the topic, the following research questions are considered: (a) What roles can a public actor have in an industrial CE ecosystem? (b) What are the relationship modes a public actor can have? (c) In what kind of actor structures may the roles and modes occur? The study relies on two multiple case studies in the international (Study 1) and Finnish eco-industrial parks (Study 2) contexts. The results are based on qualitative content analysis conducted with both primary and secondary data. As a result, six distinct roles—operator, organizer, financer, supporter, policymaker, and regulator—and two modes—facilitative and dirigiste—for public agency in industrial CE ecosystems were identified. The roles depict the concrete means used by public actors whereas the modes depict the characteristics of these actions. Finally, exemplar organization models for the recognized roles and modes in industrial CE ecosystems were examined. The study provides insights into how public actors can contribute to sustainability transitions among their territories and helps practitioners to better understand the premises for public–private interaction.

Circular economy research: A bibliometric analysis (2000–2019) and future research insights

This study undertakes an empirical analysis of the circular economy (CE) literature published between 2000 and 2019 and articulates the key research themes on the basis of content analysis and citation mapping of the top-cited CE-related articles. HistCite software was used to perform bibliometric citation meta-analysis on a sample of 2279 articles, obtained from the ISI Web of Science database, having 89,995 global cited references. Influential journals, articles, yearly trends, institutions, and authors in CE research were identified and presented in this study. Content analysis and citation mapping of the top-cited 33 articles revealed the following key research themes: 1) CE assessment methods and frameworks, 2) CE concept and sustainability, 3) Inter-disciplinary research in circular context, 4) CE adoption – country, region or firm level, 5) CE recycling, recovery, and reuse, 6) CE and environmental economics, 7) CE and eco-industrial parks, 8) CE and resource life extension, 9) CE and design of circular products and 10) CE rebound. Subsequently, a knowledge synthesis approach was applied to develop an integrated, multi-dimensional conceptual framework depicting the linkage between CE drivers, stakeholders, CE practice indicators, and performance measures. Finally, future research directions from recent articles were analyzed, and suggestions are made for future CE research themes.

China’s green transformation through eco-industrial parks

• A comprehensive review of China’s green transformation through the lense of eco-industrial parks. • Key lessons learned in implementing China’s green development strategy. • Environmental and competitiveness performance of EIPs were analyzed. • Policy recommendations for China to streamline EIPs implementation. China has achieved remarkable results in green transformation through the implementation of eco-industrial parks (EIPs). Why China chose EIPs as the main vehicle for green transformation? How did it do? Do the EIP interventions also contribute to the economic competitiveness? Most existing studies so far have revealed that EIPs can improve the environmental performance, however, few studies examined their impact on economic competitiveness. This paper intends to systematically analyze China’s EIP programs, and examine whether the EIP interventions have improved both their environmental and competitiveness performances as well as the correlation of these two dimensions, through empirical studies based on multiple data sources. The results largely verify the effects of both environmental and competitiveness improvements. Further correlation analysis based on a small sample, however, shows there exists a more complex relationship between competitiveness performance and environmental performance. The paper also identifies the key lessons learned in implementing China’s green transformation strategy through EIPs. The authors challenge the conventional wisdom that investing in green technologies and ensuring compliance with eco-industrial standards often leads to cost increases and loss of economic competitiveness for both individual firms and industrial zones as a whole. The findings strengthen the evidence base for Chinese policy-makers and the business case for entrepreneurs when considering green investments.

Problematique Approach to Analyse Barriers in Implementing Industrial Ecology in Philippine Industrial Parks

Industrial ecology is recognized as an important framework toward a circular economy wherein industrial systems minimize their environmental burden by mimicking the material cycles and energy cascades found in biological ecosystems. Advocates of such framework in planning of eco-industrial parks suggest that both economic and environmental gains can be attained by transforming the industrial production from a linear to a closed loop system. However, it is imperative first to understand and analyze systematically the barriers in implementing the concept of industrial ecology in industrial parks even at the early planning stage. This work thus proposes a problematique approach to understand and analyse such barriers toward a successful development of eco-industrial parks. A problematique is a term coined by Warfield referring to concepts and tools for a structural model of relationships among members of a set of problems. The problematique is shown to be effective in analyzing the structure that underlies problematic situations, thus increasing the potential for crafting solution through human intervention. An illustrative case study was presented using a methodological framework built from Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL), Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) and Analytic Network Process (ANP). Among the identified barriers in an industrial park situated in Philippines, the method reveals the strength and direction of interaction, hierarchical network structure, prioritization of components, and the causal loop mapping to aid stakeholders in systems thinking and problem solving for such complex issues.

A multi-objective multi-period mathematical model for an industrial symbiosis network based on the forest products industry

The efficient use of natural resources and energy become a critical issue due to the increasing population and environmental pollution worldwide. Recently, industrial symbiosis as a way of better utilization of natural resources has gained popularity. The forest industry is one of the most critical sectors since wood is a valuable natural resource. In this study, we propose a theoretical industrial symbiosis network located in an eco-industrial park, which is hosting companies focused on forest industry such as pulp & paper producers, pellet plants, sawmill, fiberboard, and particleboard producers. The designed network also includes an organic fertilizer plant and a water treatment facility. To establish the network, life cycle assessment (LCA) method is utilized. Data obtained from LCA enables us to determine the amount and type of possible by-products, waste and energy that can be exchanged in this network. Next, the location of the plants in the park is determined using the Automated Layout DEsign Program (ALDEP) by considering the flows of by-products and waste between facilities. Finally, the economic and environmental benefits of stakeholders in the network are analyzed using the developed multi-objective multi-period mathematical model. The objectives of this model are to minimize the total production cost of the companies in the network and to minimize their CO2 emissions, simultaneously. Results reveal that in such an industrial symbiosis network in which the ultimate goal is cleaner production, the use of virgin resources will decrease while the economic benefits of companies in the network increase.

Targeting anchor process via cooperative game-based optimisation approach within integrated palm oil-based complex

Recent threats to sustainability in the palm oil milling industry such as methane emissions, has impacted the palm oil market negatively. To facilitate methane emission mitigation, most palm oil mills opt for expensive biogas facilities. An alternative solution to this expensive biogas facility, can be an integrated palm oil-based complex (POBC). POBC is proposed to reduce environmental consequences while maximising the palm oil mill profit by integrating it with a palm oil refinery and implementing POME elimination strategy. However, in order to understand the feasibility of the POBC, it is important to identify the most crucial process otherwise known as the anchor process. The anchor process can be determined based on the allocation of incremental economic benefits among the internal processes. On that account, in work proposes a new process-level performance allocation approach based on cooperative game theory to investigate future optimisation strategies for the POBC. Cooperative game theory was previously applied for rationally allocating incremental profits among collaborating parties and determining anchor tenant within an eco-industrial park. In this study, the cooperative game model analyses internal processes instead of collaborating plants to determine the anchor process. The anchor process is critical for defining performance benchmarks for other processes within the POBC. The developed framework is applied consecutively on the given POBC case study based on the presented framework. The optimal results obtained are analysed to determine the anchor process for deciding suitable strategies to improve the overall profitability of POBC.

An industrial structure adjustment model to facilitate high-quality development of an eco-industrial park

The tradeoff between economic growth and environmental protection has been a critical issue in facilitating eco-industrial park development in China. As the principal contributors to China's industrial output, many industrial parks have been addressing the issues of intensive resource consumption and pollutant generation, driven by much stricter regulations on the environment and resource management. Retuning the industrial structure is a substantial way to address the environmental issues while promoting economic development, which are the goals of eco-industrial development. This study proposes a multi-criteria industrial structure adjustment model by employing a generalized reduced gradient method to find the optimal structure of an industrial park. The model aims to increase the overall resource utilization efficiency and industrial output efficiency through a decoupling between the economic development and environmental burden of the park. A Chinese eco-industrial park located in the capital, the Beijing Economic-technological Development Area (BDA), is used as an example to uncover a transformation roadmap from a high-speed mode to a high-quality mode. The constraints of the multi-criteria decision-making model mainly focus on the limits of water consumption and pollutant emissions by targeting an appropriate economic development rate. The key findings are as follows. First, BDA could achieve 186% economic growth with 20% water consumption and 30% contaminant reduction in five years (2020–2025) by optimizing the industrial structure. Second, the advanced manufacturing industries play significant roles in stimulating the high-quality development. Third, ammonia nitrogen is a crucial factor restricting economic development under the requests of the “dual control” policy. Forth, the industry that can use reclaimed water in production will get more development opportunities and space, and vice versa. The model can be applied in diverse industrial parks by modifying the parameters and associated constraints.

Dynamics of long-term policy implementation of Eco-transformation of industrial parks in China

The concept of Ecological Transformation of Industrial Parks (ETIPs) has been translated into diverse policy practices worldwide. To gain insights into the dynamics of adapting novel policy concepts in new contexts and further safeguarding them for durable and effective policy outcomes of ETIPs, we built on policy translation framework and adopted Event Sequence Analysis to reconstruct and compare successive policy translation patterns of Eco-industrial Park (EIP) and Circular Economy Industrial Park (CEIP) in China. The results show that both the policies manifested the sequential dynamics of 1) adapting the novel concepts in new contexts through the single-agency approach in the early phase and 2) stabilizing policy outputs gradually to achieve effective outcomes through the multi-actor cooperation in the late phase. A key policy implication is that the sequential features are useful for countries as "latecomers" of ETIPs to detect the signals of emerging local initiatives and facilitating them into nation-wide practices. Importantly, this process may take decades and requires the patience of policy makers.

계량서지 분석을 통한 생태산업단지의 국제적 연구 동향 규명

Purpose: To understand the global status of Korean eco-industrial park(EIP) research and enhance the future EIP role for sustainable development, this study aims to identify global trends of EIP researches. Method: This study conducted an exhaustive investigation of EIP research documents published in international academia from 1995 to 2019. The bibliographic analysis methods such as citation analysis and co-occurrence analysis are used to find the relationships between the documents. The relationships are analysed and visualized using VOSviewer software. Result: China has published the most EIP research documents, and the studies conducted in the United States have had the greatest impact on many countries. The hottest topic in the EIP study was “symbiosis” and the latest topic was related to the “circulatory economy”. In 1998, the world’s first EIP research paper was published in the field of urban research. Korea’s first EIP research paper published in 2005 in the international academia also belongs to the urban research field. Globally, the studies in the field have been conducted mainly on the theme of converting existing industrial complexes to EIP.

Optimal design of exchange networks with blind inputs and its application to Eco-industrial parks

Motivated by the design and optimization of the water exchange networks in Eco-Industrial Parks (EIP), we investigate the abstract Blind-Input model for general exchange networks. This abstract model is based on a Game Theory approach, formulating it as a Single-Leader-Multi-Follower (SLMF) game: at the upper level, there is an authority (leader) that aims to minimize the consumption of natural resources, while, at the lower level, agents (followers) try to minimize their operating costs. We introduce the notion of Blind-Input contract, which is an economic contract between the authority and the agents in order to ensure the participation of the latter ones in the exchange networks. More precisely, when participating in the exchange network, each agent accepts to have a blind input in the sense that she controls only her output fluxes, and the authority commits to guarantee a minimal relative improvement in comparison with the agent’s stand-alone operation. The SLMF game is equivalently transformed into a single mixed-integer optimization problem. Thanks to this reformulation, examples of EIP of realistic size are then studied numerically.

Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) Model of an Industrial Ecosystem: An Agent-Based Modeling Approach

This paper addresses the application of the Agent-Based Model (ABM) to simulate the evolution of Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) eco-industrial parks to gain insight into their behavior. ABM technique has proven to be an effective tool that can be used to express the evolution of eco-industrial parks. The ABM represents autonomous entities, each with dynamic behavior. The agents within the eco-industrial park are factories, market buyers, and market sellers. The results showed that the Réseau agent-based model allowed the investigation of the behaviors exhibited by different agents in exchange for materials in the industrial park.

Generalized Framework for the Design of Eco-Industrial Parks: Case Study of End-of-Life Vehicles

Eco-industrial parks (EIPs) are promoting a shift from the traditional linear model to the circular model, where industrial symbiosis plays an important role in encouraging the exchange of materials, energy, and waste. This paper proposes a generalized framework to design eco-industrial parks, and illustrates it with regard to the end-of-life vehicle problem (ELV). An eco-industrial park for end-of-life vehicles (EIP-4-ELVs) creates synergy in the network that leverages waste reduction and efficiently uses resources. The performance of the proposed framework is investigated along with the interactions between nodes. The proposed framework consists of five steps: (1) finding motivation for EIP, (2) identifying all entities with industrial symbiosis, (3) pinpointing the anchor entity, (4) determining industrial symbiosis between at least three entities and two exchange flows, and (5) defining exchange-flow types. The two last steps are connected by a feedback loop to allow future exchange flows. The proposed framework serves as a guideline for decision makers during the first stages of developing EIPs. Furthermore, the framework can be linked to car-design software to predict the recyclability of vehicle components and aid in manufacturing vehicles optimized for recycling.

Eco-Industrial Parks: Experiences from Turkey

The development of Eco-Industrial Parks (EIPs) is an emerging concept that is being spread in Turkey as a sustainable development model. This study analyzes the improvement of EIPs in Turkey and discusses prevailing problems on transferring Organized Industrial Zones (OIZ) to EIPs.

An Optimal Water-Waste Nexus for an Eco-Industrial Park

Resource sustainability is a top priority agenda nowadays which is extensively discussed in the circular economy concept. Reduction of water consumption, as well as final waste generation can be achieved by implementation of process integration and optimisation techniques. Promotion of eco-industrial park (EIP) as an option to improve conventional industrial park will enable the symbiotic participation of all parties, including the nearby domestic community. In this paper, a mathematical model is developed to maximise profit generation from simultaneous resource recovery and water integration from the wastewater. The novelty lies on consideration of multiples sources from industrial and domestic streams, while performing simultaneous regeneration, recycle, and reuse of water and resource recovery works. A superstructure and the associated mathematical equations are developed. Five types of contaminants i.e Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), Total Dissolved Solid (TDS), Total Suspended Solid (TSS), Chromium (Cr), and Zinc (Zn) will be considered in the model. Generic Algorithm Modelling System (GAMS) is used as the optimisation tool. The case study result shows that a total annual profit of 200,788 USD/y could be generated by the centralized wastewater utility service provider and the payback period is less than 3 y. As a result, 37 % of freshwater could be minimized and 0.02 dry t/h of waste metal precipitate can be recovered from the wastewater. The demand side is also economically benefitted as the cost of supplied water is 10 % lower than the typical cost. The model provides insight on how the domestic and industrial sources can be symbiotically integrated, while retaining economic benefits to the centralized wastewater utility service provider and the demands.

Circular eco-industrial park design inspired by nature: An integrated non-linear optimization, location, and food web analysis

Industrial symbiosis (IS) is one of the alternative ways of using natural resources in industrial processes. Eco-industrial parks (EIPs), as commonly known areas of IS practices, increase resource efficacy and reduce environmental effects by implementing waste/by product exchanges among tenant plants. Although there is an increasing but limited number of EIPs around the world, their circularity is not ensured due to high dynamic market and business conditions. This paper aims at offering an innovative design approach for EIPs taking into account the potential waste exchanges between the plants potentially to be co-located within EIPs with the goal of eliminating adverse impacts of market and business dynamicity. To this end, first an analysis of an existing IS database is conducted and the sectors potentially to be co-located are identified. Second, inspired by natural eco-systems, the food web (FW) metrics are defined to measure the potential EIPs' circularity. Third, a non-linear optimization method, namely branch and bound algorithm, is adopted to decide which plants should be included in the EIP designs to maximize the cyclicity of the networks. Lastly, a location analysis is conducted in order to co-locate the plants and to minimize the operational costs of implementing and running the EIPs. The use of this integrated approach is illustrated in a scenario analysis for four theoretical EIPs, two taking the construction industry as an anchor industry and two considering the random inclusion of various industries that can exchange wastes with the constructions industry. These EIPs' FW metric values are compared with the biological FW averages of natural ecosystems. The results support the method's ability to design sustainable and circular EIPs and point out practical implications for practitioners and policy-makers. The study is a seminal one integrating three methodologies for the first time to design IS networks in the form of EIPs.

Industrial Symbiosis in Taiwan: Case Study on Linhai Industrial Park

Eco-industrial parks (EIP) are a community of manufacturing businesses which seek better environmental and economic performance by using the principles of Industrial Ecology (IE). In Taiwan, government-designated EIPs have operated since 1995, with 23 industrial parks currently in operation. This study presents a case from Taiwan, the Linhai Industrial park, and analyzes the park’s transition towards industrial symbiosis and resource sharing. Resource sharing modifications resulted in reduced carbon emissions, millions of liters of fuel saved, and thousands of tons of industrial waste recycled. This successful transition was possible because of coordinated government support. Key factors include technological subsidies, policy support, and willing manufacturers. Additional explanations for Linhai’s current success are explored and future areas of research are identified.

OntoPowSys: A power system ontology for cross domain interactions in an eco industrial park

Knowledge management in multi-domain, heterogeneous industrial networks like an Eco-Industrial Park (EIP) is a challenging task. In this paper, an ontology-based management system has been proposed for addressing this challenge. It focuses on the power systems domain and provides a framework for integrating this knowledge with the other domains of an EIP. The proposed ontology, OntoPowSys is expressed using a Description Logics (DL) syntax and the OWL2 language was used to make it alive. It is then used as a part of the Knowledge Management System (KMS) in a virtual EIP called the J-Park Simulator (JPS). The advantages of the proposed approach are demonstrated by conducting two case studies on the JPS. The first case study illustrates the application of optimal power flow (OPF) in the electrical network of the JPS. The second case study plays an important role in understanding the cross-domain interactions between the chemical and electrical engineering domains in a bio-diesel plant of the JPS. These case studies are available as web services on the JPS website. The results showcase the advantages of using ontologies in the development of decision support tools. These tools are capable of taking into account contextual information on top of data during their decision-making processes. They are also able to exchange knowledge across different domains without the need for a communication interface.

Eco-industrial parks’ structural characteristics and mechanisms: A case of Xinzhuang and comparison studies

Understanding the structural characteristics, evolution, and associated mechanisms of different types of eco-industrial parks (EIPs) is important. Using complex network methods, this paper distinguishes planned-type and spontaneous-type EIPs by analyzing some cases of EIPs (especially China’s Xinzhuang EIP). The findings are as follows: (1) planned-type EIPs demonstrate more diverse sub-structures than spontaneous EIPs (more specifically, planned-type EIPs usually involve more obvious clustering phenomena and closer communication); (2) though in planned EIPs all kinds of centralities are reasonable for determining key enterprises, in spontaneous EIPs closeness and between centrality prove better measures than eigenvector centrality; (3) small-world and scale-free characteristics are important for enhancing flow transmission in both planned EIPs and spontaneous EIPs (specifically, planned EIPs show more significant small-world/scale-free effects than spontaneous EIPs, and scale-free characteristics with degree distribution coefficient 0.5–2.0 make EIPs less invulnerable); and (4) the Xinzhuang EIP is vulnerable in the network configuration under the attacks. It is important to maintain the stable stay and development of the key enterprises in an EIP. Comparing information and environmental scenarios for Xinzhuang EIP reveals that the park’s performance or efficiency is likely to be better in an information scenario. In a word, our results reveal the development mechanisms of EIPs, methods of evaluating key enterprises, ways of link reforms, structural stability of EIPs, and future scenarios predictions in terms of the practical situations.

Optimal Design of Eco-Industrial Parks with coupled energy networks addressing Complexity bottleneck through an Interdependence analysis

By gathering in Eco-Industrial Parks (EIPs), companies obtain benefits from synergistic cooperation but it also creates a risk by increasing interdependencies. The aim of this paper is to provide a method for optimally design exchanges that takes into consideration real stakes of companies. This resolution method is assessed on a multi-period MILP model of coupled energy networks integrating a utility system producing steam at different pressure levels and a mutualized on-grid Hybrid Power System (HPS) providing electricity using Renewable Energy (RE) sources. Design concerns interconnections between companies such as boilers, turbines and power of RE sources. A multi-stage approach is developped to minimize network complexity and Net Present Value (NPV) of the overall network. Lastly, an interdependency analysis is proposed to choose the optimal solution. Tested on a case study involving 15 companies, the optimal exchanges have been raised to satisfy demands over four time periods.

A regional integrated energy system with a coal-fired CHP plant, screw turbine and solar thermal utilization: Scenarios for China

Regional integrated energy system has been a suitable scheme in China to satisfy eco-industrial park’s both electric and heat needs. Combined heat and power (CHP) is an efficient technology for coal-fired plants during heating seasons. Currently, wires transport electric from CHP to destination while urban pipes network transport heat from CHP to destination, respectively. However, this might not be the case in future, when eco-industrial parks are close to plants or pipes network can’t carry enough heat. This paper presents a feasible regional integrated energy system which meets both electric and heat’s needs with steam from CHP while maintaining photothermal resources’ high percent utilization. This system includes a coal-fired CHP plant, pressure matcher, steam supply pipeline, screw turbine and solar thermal utilization part. This paper set up a model of 600 MW electric power CHP with pressure matcher and screw turbine in Ebsilon software. Then the steam supply pipeline and solar thermal utilization part were developed and analyzed based on the basic thermodynamic theories with Beijing and Huzhou’s meteorological statistics taken into consideration. Besides, the operational issues of the regional system were also listed. Meanwhile, the regional integrated energy system was obtained and a lot of characteristics were analyzed. Main devices were further investigated with energy, exergy and entransy analysis. Three extreme working situations were also carried out and discussed in the end. Several useful conclusions were drawn. It’s necessary for China to masterly integrate regional energy system with multi-energy. Moreover, pressure matcher is high-efficient in general under other parameters’ influences. This extracting steam’s technology might be considered in future. Besides, low-stent placed pipeline which can transport high-parameter steam 4 km at most was introduced. A proper mass flow value or lower inlet temperature will both reduce loss of pipeline. Furthermore, heat user side can offer electric power about 9.22 MW, heating acreage about 0.79 km2 to the eco-industrial park. More solar heat’s import, lower upper temperature difference and less sunlight will favor solar thermal utilization part. Higher heat load or lower CHP’s working condition will benefit screw turbine. Peak heat exchanger doesn’t need to work when supply domestic water temperature’s demand is less than 65 °C. The simulation in this paper might give technological statistics to the regional integrated energy system which has CHP and photothermal. This will help to put this energy system into actual use in future.