Resumen de Innovation of the process-equipment system in a context of sustainability
In search to contribute to the current fight against climate change, the industrial sector is immersed in a transition to the Circular Economy (CE) to achieve resource efficiency through the redesign of products and production processes. However, the implementation of the CE closed loops is still in an initial phase and focuses mainly on the recycling of products. Early works on CE emphasized the need to implement an emissions reuse closed loops through technology, but this issue has not been addressed by scientific and industrial experts with a successful implementation in the industry.
Equipment can play a critical role in the redesign of production processes through the implementation of emissions reuse closed loops, as it is in the operational phase of the equipment in which most environmental resources are consumed and most emissions are generated in production processes. The implementation of the emissions reuse closed loops through equipment will only be possible if the equipment consumes resources in production processes more efficiently, reduces waste and emissions and reuses them as a new primary material resource.
The presented thesis proposes a conceptual model for the implementation of the CE emissions reuse closed loops in production processes through equipment as a way to accelerate the transition from industry to CE. The conceptual model integrates the concepts of reduction, reuse, recycling and recovery of emissions of the Cleaner Production (CP) and the transverse analysis of the diachronic and synchronous dimensions of the equipment. The implementation of the proposed conceptual model will only be possible through the redesign of production processes. In this sense, the presented thesis also proposes a process redesign methodology for its implementation.
The redesign for emissions reuse (R4ER) methodology has been verified through application in an equipment manufacturing company and a research institute. The results of the presented thesis have demonstrated that the application of the methodology has allowed the reduction of the consumption of resources, the generation of emissions as well as the reduction of operating costs in a sterilization central and a grinding wheel production process.
