Managing technology performance risk in the strategic design of biomass-based supply chains for energy in the transport sector

Federico d'Amore and Fabrizio Bezzo

Energy, 2017, vol. 138, issue C, 563-574

Abstract: Biomass has long been considered one of the most promising feedstock as an alternative primary source to substitute traditional fuels in the transport sectors. However, both biomass intrinsic variability and the fact that several conversion technologies have not reached full maturity make the economic assessment of the production system performance rather difficult. This paper proposes a quantitative approach for the strategic design and optimisation of biomass-based supply chains under uncertainty on technology conversion efficiency. The methodology is based on regret theory and allows quantifying both risk and regret with respect to benchmark economic outputs. A Mixed Integer Linear Programming is employed to represent and optimise the profitability of a multi-echelon, multi-period and spatially explicit biomass-based supply chain for bioethanol and bioelectricity production where several conversion technologies are simultaneously taken into account. The modelling framework includes biomass cultivation, transport, conversion, distribution and final usage in alternative fuel vehicles (running either on bioethanol or bioelectricity). Results demonstrate how the methodology can help policy-makers and investors assessing technological options according to their risk aversion attitude.

Keywords: Bioethanol and bioelectricity; Supply chain optimisation; Electric vehicles; Optimisation under uncertainty; Technology conversion efficiency; Regret theory; Risk management (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544217312501
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:138:y:2017:i:c:p:563-574

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2017.07.074

Access Statistics for this article

Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser

More articles in Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().