Dear colleagues,Our next ENRE online event takes place next Thursday March 24, 2022, starting at 16:00 (UK time). *** Note the later start than usual ***Please feel free to forward this invitation to anyone who might be interested. For more information and recordings of past seminars, see blogs.ed.ac.uk/enreWe hope to see many of you next week,Miguel Anjos and Lars Schewe=====================================================
24 March 2022 16:00-17:30 UK time (on Zoom) | Taraneh Sowlati & Sahar Ahmadvand (University of British Columbia)
*** Note the later start than usual ***
Link: https://ed-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/89475633391 (Meeting ID: 894 7563 3391 Passcode: TJE0c6CD)
Sustainable forest-based biomass supply chains (Taraneh Sowlati)
Forest-based biomass has been used as a renewable source to produce value-added products in bioconversion facilities. Its utilization to produce bioproducts has economic, social and environmental benefits. Generating addition revenue stream for the forest sector, reducing fossil fuel dependency and GHG emissions, and creating jobs in forestry-dependent communities are some of these benefits. However, there are challenges in utilizing forest-based biomass in many regions due to its low bulk density, high moisture content, low energy value, and seasonal and dispersed availability. These characteristics contribute to high preprocessing, handling, storage and transportation costs and make its supply chain complex and costly. Furthermore, variations in forest-based biomass supply quantity and quality, demand, costs and prices add additional complexity to its supply chain planning. In order to improve the competitiveness of forest-based biomass as a feedstock, supply chain management and optimization have been done in many previous studies. In this talk, the recent advances in sustainable planning of this renewable source at IERG will be presented.
Dr. Taraneh Sowlati is a Professor in the Department of Wood Science, Faculty of Forestry at the University of British Columbia (UBC). She leads the Industrial Engineering Research Group. Over the past decade, the focus of her research has been on biomass supply chains. Most of her current projects are related to utilizing forest-based biomass to generate value added bio-products and optimizing their supply chains. Her research involves evaluation of economic, environmental and social aspects of bio-based products and processes. She and her research group develop mathematical programming models and decision support tools to manage and optimize integrated and sustainable forest-based biomass supply chains considering uncertainties, risks, multiple viewpoints, and multiple criteria.
A robust optimization model for tactical planning of the forest-based biomass supply chain for syngas production (Sahar Ahmadvand)
Production of bioenergy and biofuels from forest-based biomass provides an economically and environmentally attractive use of an otherwise wasted material. However, from the collection to conversion, the supply chain of forest-based biomass is tainted with many challenges and uncertainties that impact its economic performance. In the literature, most papers focused on the long-term optimization of forest-based biomass gasification supply chains using deterministic models. In this paper, the supply chain of forest-based biomass for syngas production is optimized at the tactical level considering uncertainties. A robust optimization model is developed and applied to the real case of a large Kraft pulp mill in British Columbia, Canada. The total supply chain cost of the case study based on the robust optimization model is 67% higher than that of the deterministic model, however, the robust model provides a single optimal solution that is feasible for all parameter values within their considered uncertainty intervals.
Sahar Ahmadvand (B.Sc. and M.Sc. Industrial Engineering, Iran) is a Ph.D. candidate in the Industrial Engineering Research Group, Faculty of Forestry, University of British Columbia. Her research involves mathematical programming and uncertainty modeling for optimization and planning of the forest bioenergy supply chains.
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Miguel F. Anjos, Ph.D., P.Eng., FHEA, SMIEEE, FEUROPT, FCAE
President, INFORMS Section on Energy, Natural Resources, and the Environment (ENRE)
Vice-President, INFORMS International Activities
Chair of Operational Research, School of Mathematics, University of Edinburgh, U.K.
Schöller Senior Fellow, University of Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany
http://www.miguelanjos.com/------------------------------