Papers by Francesca Intini
This paper presents the experience of Master srl, an Apulia company that produces accessories for... more This paper presents the experience of Master srl, an Apulia company that produces accessories for windows, and addressed its production toward low environmental impact policies. The increasing interest on the environmental policies of the products and on the environmental sustainability certifications carried the Master to study the environmental performances of its products and to communicate the results to their customers. The used methodology was the LCA; Master also examined the performance of its products with reference to the requirements of the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), one of the most used Environmental Sustainability Assessment for Buildings.
Life cycle assessment (LCA) of an energy recovery plant in the olive oil industries
Sustainable Demanufacturing Technologies for Photovoltaic Panels
This study is focused on the demanufacturing of Wasted Electric and Electronic Equipment (WEEE), ... more This study is focused on the demanufacturing of Wasted Electric and Electronic Equipment (WEEE), a true 'treasure' of precious metals and rare elements. In particular, it will concentrate on one complex sub-class of WEEE, sharing the same multi-layer, multi-material and matrix-structured features: Photovoltaic panels (PVPs). Due to their complex structure, effective and sustainable demanufacturing of these components is far from being achieved. Existing approaches are, in-fact, unsustainable because mainly based on trial-and-error methods that lack of theoretical basis and/or scientific evidences. The paper presents a new proposal for a more sustainable demanufacturing process of PVP, discussing pro's and con's.
Systemic view in Strategic Environmental Management is gaining even more attention. The paper pro... more Systemic view in Strategic Environmental Management is gaining even more attention. The paper proposes the case of a Territorial Environmental and Social Assessment (TESA), based on a Life-cycle approach, applied to set-up the Matera Provincial Plan for a strategic environmental management. Information for performing LCA is here integrated through an Energy-Social Planning model as a decisional support tool. The city-owned buildings are critical facilities for Territorial energy management: the focus here is mainly on energy efficiency. The results obtained of the study contribute to reach EU targets according to the new Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on the energy performance of buildings.
This study is focused on the demanufacturing of Wasted Electric and Electronic Equipment (WEEE), ... more This study is focused on the demanufacturing of Wasted Electric and Electronic Equipment (WEEE), a true ‘treasure’ of precious metals and rare elements. In particular, it will concentrate on one complex sub-class of WEEE, sharing the same multi-layer, multi-material and matrix-structured features: Photovoltaic panels (PVPs). Due to their complex structure, effective and sustainable demanufacturing of these components is far from being achieved. Existing approaches are, in-fact, unsustainable because mainly based on trial-anderror methods that lack of theoretical basis and/or scientific evidences. The paper presents a new proposal for a more sustainable demanufacturing process of PVP, discussing pro’s and con’s.
International Journal of Heat and Technology, 2016
Product Sustainability assessment is becoming ever more critical in the global competition; this ... more Product Sustainability assessment is becoming ever more critical in the global competition; this is particularly true for building sector. This paper faces the problem of the analysis of sensitivity of this task by referring to a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) case of a PVC window for civil buildings applications. Sensitivity has been appreciated by referring to two functional units to evaluate the quality of the environmental impacts by relating it to the window features: per piece and per square meter of see-through surface. It resulted that the sustainability impact calculated per square meter changes considerably with the change of the type of window. This sensitivity analysis leads to propose a new criterion of the analysis to provide a reliable assessment approach to be used for the evaluation of the environmental performance of products. The difference between the values of thermal transmittance measured and calculated is inferior to 5%, which it is an absolutely optimal value.
Un modello cooperativo di gestione intermunicipale della raccolta differenziata dei rifiuti: un'applicazione del valore di Shapley
Economics and Policy of Energy and the Environment, Jul 1, 2009
A model for cooperative inter-municipal separate waste collection: an application of the Shapley ... more A model for cooperative inter-municipal separate waste collection: an application of the Shapley value - In this work we have carried out a study in order to estimate and allocate the costs related to separate waste collection in an inter-municipal area located in the province of Bari (Italy). This analysis promotes the cooperation among municipalities to manage, in an optimal way, the waste collection service. Indeed, according to Italian laws, the municipalities are responsible for organizing the management of municipal waste in accordance with principles of transparency, efficiency, effectiveness and inexpensiveness. For this reason we have built a model of separate waste collection management, highlighting the different cost functions. The total cost of the service has been divided among the individual municipalities using the theory of cooperative games, stressing that local authorities are not interested in paying off more than they would pay if they organized independently. To achieve this goal, we have created a model of aggregation of quantitative information on equipments and specialized personnel (and their costs). The problem of the cost allocation is interpreted as an example of transferable utility games and it is resolved with the technique of Shapley values that are included in the nucleolus of the inter-municipal game. Therefore it is more cost-effective to entrust a single operator with the waste collection for each area or sub domain in order not to double service costs. This work on waste management can integrate the studies and applications of the theory of cooperative games in the environmental field. Key words: Separate waste collection, Shapley values, cost allocation. JEL classifications: Q53. Parole chiave: Raccolta differenziata, valore di Shapley, allocazione dei costi.
Energy, 2016
LCA (Life Cycle Assessment) is nowadays a commonly implemented approach for evaluating resource c... more LCA (Life Cycle Assessment) is nowadays a commonly implemented approach for evaluating resource consumptions and for benchmarking purposes. It suffers some limitations, mainly related to its assumptions on linear resource-consumption behaviour as well as on the non-context specific data. On the other hand, it is an extremely powerful tool for decision-making support in the sustainability assessment of manufacturing processes, providing its well-structured approach and widely accepted procedure. Deepening the assessment capabilities of such a tool is thus an important opportunity. This paper is intended to build upon this concept by proposing an improved approach consisting in supplying in-process information concerning energy consumption and other process state conditions through thermography. The case of an Italian industrial company producing HDPE (High Density Polyethylene) nets for agriculture is taken as test bed case to show pros and cons of this idea. Actually, this approach resulted into a better assessment of the sustainability profile of the whole production process in terms of energy consumptions and environmental impacts. This in turn became an updated management tool for real-time decision making closer to the real conditions.
Energy Procedia, 2015
School buildings constitute an important part of the non-residential building stock, because stud... more School buildings constitute an important part of the non-residential building stock, because students and teachers spend much time in these rooms. This paper presents the outcome of a study on the energy performance of five different school buildings located in Matera city (South Italy). The analysis is aimed at calculating the energy requirement in accord with UNI TS 11300, comparing the results with dynamic analyses (using the Energy Plus method) and the effective energy consumptions. This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 649956. The analysis has confirmed the best precision of dynamic method respect the stationary one, with an error estimated of about the ten percent compared to the real consumptions. We also presented the energy auditing interventions for all schools and evaluate the incidence of the envelope and thermal system on energy consumptions.
Il progetto GSR-MODEL: metodologie e strumenti per la responsabilità sociale negli Enti Pubblici
ABSTRACT
Life-Cycle Assessment Comparability: A Perspective to Analyse the Heterogeneity
ABSTRACT
Energy Recovery of the Solid Waste of the Olive Oil Industries– LCA Analysis and Carbon Footprint Assessment
Renewable energy technologies contribute to the mitigation of climate change impacts through redu... more Renewable energy technologies contribute to the mitigation of climate change impacts through reduction in the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG) such as carbon dioxide. In this paper, a power plant located in Italy and fed with waste deriving from the olive oil industries is considered. The de-oiled pomace is characterised by lower caloric value equal to 4000 kcal/kg, by low content of nitrogen and sulphur and by the absence of heavy metals. A plant for the production of energy from biomass (de-oiled pomace and waste wood) is analyzed through a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach. The carbon dioxide equivalent (kgCO 2 eq) emitted into the atmosphere is equal to 0.0597 kgCO 2 eq /kWh. The GHG emissions have been compared with those of a plant for energy production that uses refuse derived fuel (RDF) and with those of one that uses coal. The environmental benefits are quantified and the possibilities to develop the use of the pomace-to-energy at national level are estimated.
Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2014
Renewable energy sources will play in the years to come a central role in moving the world onto a... more Renewable energy sources will play in the years to come a central role in moving the world onto a more secure, reliable and sustainable energy path. In this paper the case of an Italian power plant fed from biomass (de-oiled pomace and waste wood) is discussed for an agricultural district. The optimal operating conditions are addressed by setting up an information model for the improvement of accuracy of estimation of the potential of biomass from the sustainability perspective. Criticalities of data consistency and coherence are highlighted too as a function of the systemic problem introduced by the several sources within the agricultural district.
In this work we have realised and implemented a neural network in order to investigate and simula... more In this work we have realised and implemented a neural network in order to investigate and simulate the relationship between CO 2 emissions and some variables taken from national and provincial Italian statistics. The artificial intelligence application used in this study gives us the possibility to have a new forecasting model to study the earth temperature increasing due to climate change. This represents a danger for the environment but also for the whole economy. The EBP proposed neural network can learn from previous experiences and use them to estimate the CO 2 in the past, present and future. The variables have been chosen according to their connection with solid fuels, oil, natural gas, electricity consumptions, gross domestic product and resident population. We also studied CO 2 emissions impact related to natural gas, oil, solid fuels and electricity by taking in consideration the weighted average of the aggregated consumptions in macro-categories. This model allowed us to make an analysis of sensitivity in order to calculate the impact of each input parameter of the neural network on the total emission. From the experimental results it is possible to argue that oil has the greatest impact on emissions. According to our model it is necessary reduce the natural gas use by 40%, the oil use by 60%, the electricity by 20%, and avoid solid fuels, in order to achieve the Kyoto Protocol targets. Moreover our CO 2 estimation model can be used to check out the efficiency of the energetic policies adopted by each country in order to reach Kyoto targets.
Advancements and Trends
The cooperative inter-municipal waste collection can be a real added value in terms of costs redu... more The cooperative inter-municipal waste collection can be a real added value in terms of costs reduction and high performance services. The chapter proposes a Multi Agent Approach to support the inter-municipal infrastructure. The Multi Agent Systems (MAS) is an approach suitable to implement a distributed physically problem as the inter-municipal waste collection. The architecture of the approach is formalized by work-flow analysis: a static view by IDEF0 diagram and a dynamic view by UML activity diagram. This analysis promotes the cooperation among municipalities to manage the waste collection service in an optimal way. According to Italian laws, the municipalities are responsible for organizing the management of municipal waste in agreement with the principles of transparency, efficiency, effectiveness and inexpensiveness. The coordination protocol among the agents allows to divide the costs among the municipalities in an efficient way. Finally, a discrete event simulation environ...
International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, 2011
Background, aim, and scope The interest in polyethylene terephthalate (PET) recycling is quite re... more Background, aim, and scope The interest in polyethylene terephthalate (PET) recycling is quite recent, but it has been growing steadily over the past few years. In this context, the aim of this paper is to assess the eco-profile, the energy savings and the environmental benefits of the use of recycled raw materials to manufacture products for thermal insulation of buildings in Italy (i.e., PET bottles post-consumer). Materials and methods The life cycle analysis is developed according to ISO 14040/44. In this paper, based on the LCA, the main types of environmental impact of a thermal insulation product have been outlined. This study is specifically focused on polyester nonwovens, produced by a company located in Italy. The cradle-to-gate life cycle inventory is performed for the mass of product needed to give a thermal resistance R of 1 (m2 K/W). The calculation of the impacts is done with SimaPro software. With an environmental product declaration-oriented approach, a set of impact categories is used for the classification and characterisation of the life cycle impact assessment. Results The results of the impact assessment for 1m2 K/W of thermal insulation panels made with recycled PET are then compared with similar products made with virgin PET. The lower impact associated with the recycled PET for each category is underlined: the percentage reduction is around 46% in the GWP category. In the production process, the fiber-spinning phase results as the most relevant in terms of energy consumption. In addition, the energy saved when applying the thermal insulation in a building is estimated at 87 MJ/m2 per unit area per year in Rome. All the energy used during the production of a thermal insulation panel is recovered in about 2 years. Conclusions The product shows significantly low environmental impacts thanks to the use of non-virgin PET, thus maintaining high mechanical and physical properties. If the recovery of PET from separate waste collection in Italy increases, this would reduce the share of waste PET purchased from foreign countries and would therefore reduce further the impact of transports for the production of the thermal insulation panel under investigation.
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Papers by Francesca Intini