Work

The economics of numbering up a chemical process enterprise

Year: 2019

Type: article

Abstract: Chemical‐processing plants that can be numbered up by installing and operating many replicate facilities are economically and technically well suited for the conversion of geographically distributed sources of renewable or waste carbon into fuels or chemicals. Examples from the manufacture of chemicals and the installation of flue gas treatment technology suggest that the relative cost diminution should correlate through a power law (Cost / Cost 1 ∝ E −a ) with E , a measure of the experience of operating those facilities and/or the number of units that are mass manufactured and installed. The exponent, a , can be related to the complexity of the process and the characteristics of the products.

Source: Journal of Advanced Manufacturing and Processing

DOI: 10.1002/amp2.10011

Authors: Robert S. Weber, Lesley J. Snowden‐Swan

Institution: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Language: English

Topic: Capital Investment and Risk Analysis

Subfield: Finance

Field: Economics, Econometrics and Finance

Domain: Social Sciences

SDGs: Industry, innovation and infrastructure, Responsible consumption and production, Affordable and clean energy

Open Access status: green

Funders: U.S. Department of Energy, Battelle, Laboratory Directed Research and Development, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory