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Applying thermoeconomics to the analysis of the north american food chain

Abstract:

Thermoeconomic analysis is used to understand the process of cost formation and how to improve the design and the operation of extensive energy consumption systems such as power and chemical plants. This paper shows the capabilities for using the thermoeconomic analysis in environmental systems, and demonstrates that it could become a useful tool for identifying the ways for improving the energy resources cost and the efficiency of a macroeconomic system such as the American food chain. The environmental impact associated to each process in the food chain can be quantified through a thermoeconomic approach as a cost function, which represents the required natural resources to obtain a final product. Symbolic exergoeconomics is used to quantify the environmental impact of the food system. In the example, the fuel-product model is built and several simulations such as the impact of the change of meat diet basis by a vegetable diet, and reusing the residual biomass are analyzed.