Carbon-Efficient Production Scheduling of a Bioethanol Plant Considering Diversified Feedstock Pelletization Density: A Case Study

Abstract

This paper presents a dual-objective optimization model for production scheduling of bioethanol plant with carbon-efficient strategies. The model is developed throughout the bioethanol production process. Firstly, the production planning and scheduling of the bioethanol plant’s transportation, storage, pretreatment, and ethanol manufacturing are fully considered. Secondly, the carbon emissions in the ethanol manufacturing process are integrated into the model to form a dual-objective optimization model that simultaneously optimizes the production plan and carbon emissions. The effects of different biomass raw materials with optional pelletization density and pretreatment methods on production scheduling are analyzed. The influence of demand and pretreatment cost on selecting a pretreatment method and total profit is considered. A membership weighted method is developed to solve the dual-objective model. The carbon emission model and economic model are integrated into one model for analysis. An example is given to verify the effectiveness of the optimization model. At the end of the paper, the limitation of this study is discussed to provide directions for future research.