Digitalisation of Manufacturing Systems: A Literature Review of Approaches to Assess the Sustainability of Digitalisation Technologies in Production Systems

Abstract

The digitalisation of production has a positive impact on manufacturing processes in terms of resource efficiency and environmental impact, particularly in the form of increased efficiency as well as cost and resource savings. However, the use of digitalisation technologies is also associated with efforts such as costs, CO2 emissions, and raw material consumption. When planning or deciding on the digitalisation of manufacturing systems, it is therefore necessary to assess whether these technologies pay off in terms of sustainability over their life cycle. This literature review (based on the PRISMA guidelines) analyses the relevance of sustainability assessment and its methods for the digitalisation of production in research. The review reveals that research focuses on the benefits of digitalisation technologies in manufacturing, while the assessment of efforts and their benefits is in its infancy. There is a need for further research on holistic assessment methods for digitalisation technologies. In particular, there is a lack of assessment methods that consistently link the economic and environmental dimensions of sustainability, and there is also a lack of guidance for the application of assessment methods in production.