A Novel Method of Sustainability Evaluation in Machining Processes

Abstract

In order to quantitatively evaluate and improve the sustainability of machining systems, this paper presents an emergy (the amount of energy consumed in direct and indirect transformations to make a product or service) based sustainability evaluation and improvement method for machining systems, contributing to the improvement of energy efficiency, resource efficiency and environmental performance, and realizing the sustainability development. First, the driver and challenge are studied, and the scope and hypothesis of the sustainable machining system are illustrated. Then, the emergy-based conversion efficiency model is proposed, which are (1) effective emergy utilization rate (EEUR), (2) emergy efficiency of unit product (EEUP) and (3) emergy conversion efficiency (ECE), to measure and evaluate the sustainable machining system from the perspectives of energy, resource and environment. Finally, the proposed model is applied to a vehicle-bridge machining process, and the results show that this paper provides the theoretical and method support for evaluating and improving the sustainable machining processes to decouple the resources and development of the manufacturing industry.