The simulation-based analysis of the resource efficiency of the circular economy – the enabling role of metallurgical infrastructure

ABSTRACT

Process metallurgy is a key enabler and the heart of the Circular Economy (CE). This paper shows the state-of-the-art approach to understanding the resource efficiency of very large-scale CE systems. Process simulation permits system-wide exergy analysis also linked to environmental footprinting. It is shown that digital twins of large CE systems can be created and their resource efficiencies quantified. This approach provides the basis for detailed estimation of financial expenditures as well as high-impact CE system innovation. The cadmium telluride (CdTe) photovoltaic technology life cycle, which brings several metal infrastructures into play, is studied. The results show that considerable work remains to optimise the CdTe system. Low exergy efficiencies resulting specifically from energy-intensive processes highlight areas with the greatest renewables-based improvement potential. This detail sheds light on the true performance of the CE and the inconvenient truth that it cannot be fully realised but only driven to its thermodynamic limits.

KEYWORDS:

• Circular economy
• exergy
• life cycle assessment
• metallurgy
• photovoltaics
• resource efficiency
• sustainability
• digital twin

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

N.J. Bartie http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4835-9560

M. Fröhling http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5429-1163

M.A. Reuter http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0500-4863

Notes

1 The amount of exergy dissipated in a transformation process is referred to as the irreversibility of that process.

2 In exergy analysis, fuels do not only refer to conventional fuels, but to all sources of exergy entering the system—as mass and energy.