Pre-emptive life cycle design for material and energy production under resource constraints

2019 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 16H06126
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (A)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Research Field: Reaction engineering/Process system
• Research Institution: The University of Tokyo
• Principal Investigator: Kikuchi Yasunori 東京大学, 未来ビジョン研究センター, 准教授 (70545649)
• Project Period (FY): 2016-04-01 – 2020-03-31
• Keywords: 地域資源 / 再生可能資源 / バイオマス / プロセスシミュレーション / ライフサイクルアセスメント / 産業連関分析 / 消費者選好性調査

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Technology options for producing materials and energy have widely been developed and should be implemented into society. The suitability of such technology options must be carefully examined with the current regional characteristics such as local resources, infrastructure, regulations, and stakeholders. While the information of technology options under development is not sufficiently clarified, the system design and assessment should be conducted on the future possibility of available options, otherwise the mid- and long-term strategy cannot be enacted for social systems. In this study, pre-emptive life cycle design (LCD) was proposed to assess the technology systems options for sustainable materials and energy production. Case studies on various technology options were conducted and demonstrated that the pre-emptive LCD enables the system design based on their future possibilities on environmental impacts and local circulation.

Free Research Field

プロセスシステム工学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

新たな技術システムオプションが研究開発後に社会へ導入されるためには、様々な試験を繰り返す必要があり、多くの組み合わせが存在するオプション全体を対象とした検討は現実的ではない。本研究で提案したpre-emptive LCDでは、ライフサイクル評価や産業連関分析といった、比較的既に存在しているシステムに対する評価を実施してきた手法を、導入前に実施可能とするために必要となる要件を明らかにした。これにより、新規な技術システムをより迅速かつ高効率に社会へ実装する支援となる。