Industrial Decarbonization by a New Energy-Baseline Methodology. Case Study

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear authors

I find this article interesting being it a case study. For this reason tough I would find it more appropriate to use the tert tested instead of validated. For example you state "This method is validated in a case study applied to the plastic injection process, the result is an energy baseline in accordance with the requirements of ISO Standards 50001, which is used as a reference
for determining energy savings that contribute to the cleaner manufacturing industry targets".

 

In the introduction section there are, in my opinion, too many references on the ISO (I think it would be enough to introduce it). Especially as it is well described in the methods section.

For the same reason I would recommend not to extend the conclusions as valid for different industries (unless further research).

That said I consider this work valuable and I would advise for its publication after minor revisions. 

Author Response

I find this article interesting being it a case study. For this reason tough I would find it more appropriate to use the tert tested instead of validated. For example you state "This method is validated in a case study applied to the plastic injection process, the result is an energy baseline in accordance with the requirements of ISO Standards 50001, which is used as a reference
for determining energy savings that contribute to the cleaner manufacturing industry targets".

 Thank you very much for your time and comments. To clarify this idea, and the use of ISO 50001,  We have added a paragraph on line 28

“The method is applied to the plastic injection process and the result is an energy baseline (EBL) in accordance with the requirements of ISO 50001, which serves as a reference for determining energy savings. The EBL provides a reduction in energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions in a sector such as plastics, which accounts for 15% of Colombia's manufacturing GDP.”

 

In the introduction section there are, in my opinion, too many references on the ISO (I think it would be enough to introduce it). Especially as it is well described in the methods section.

thank you very much for this comment, we have changed it to avoid many references

For the same reason I would recommend not to extend the conclusions as valid for different industries (unless further research).

We have corrected it, focusing only on the plastics industry

Line 387

“This applied methodology is exportable to the global production of the plastic industry with the aim of reducing carbon emissions and saving energy consumption.”

Line 374

“it will be possible to carry out energy consumption monitoring and quantify the influence of the production variable in an plastic industry, which demands high consumption in the injection processes.”

 

That said I consider this work valuable and I would advise for its publication after minor revisions. 

Thank you very much for all your time and every comment in this review. We very much appreciate your review.

Reviewer 2 Report

The article is focused on the decarbonization on industries by implementation of energy management systems in accordance with the ISO standards 50001. 

Reduction of energy consumption is the best driver for decarbonization of industrial activity and the aim of this manuscript is to provide a method for evaluating energy efficiency improvement. However, the proposed methodology is weak and does not contribute to the existing literature. The use of linear regression to find a benchmark is not the best choice. I would recommend to apply frontier models (like SFA or DEA). Frontier techniques are the best alternative for benchmarking. See for reference:

Bogetoft, P., & Otto, L. (2010). Benchmarking with DEA, SFA, and R. Springer Science & Business Media.

The paper needs a complete review and carefull explanation of the case study. There is no reference to the case study in the abstract, and it is not clear why authors choose Colombia as reference country. In fact, there are few mentions about Colombia in the whole paper. Also, the industrial sector (plastic industry) is not justified. 

It is difficult to follow the research line in the paper. Some references to figures are wrong. Fig 1 and Fig 2 are repeated and along the paper there are references to figures 8 and 9 that are missing. I think that the figures are not properly listed, and recommend to check it.

The saving potential figures are only presented in the last two lines of the paper (last parragraph of Conclusions). The conclusions section is not a place for showing new results.

I recommend to justify some of the figures presented along the paper. For instance, in line 36 there si a reference of 2% without further explanation. Similar in line 40 with a 25%.

A full review of tipo error is required. In the title there is a mistake (descarbonization instead of decarbonization).

 

 

 

Author Response

The article is focused on the decarbonization on industries by implementation of energy management systems in accordance with the ISO standards 50001. 

Reduction of energy consumption is the best driver for decarbonization of industrial activity and the aim of this manuscript is to provide a method for evaluating energy efficiency improvement. However, the proposed methodology is weak and does not contribute to the existing literature. The use of linear regression to find a benchmark is not the best choice. I would recommend to apply frontier models (like SFA or DEA). Frontier techniques are the best alternative for benchmarking. See for reference:

Bogetoft, P., & Otto, L. (2010). Benchmarking with DEA, SFA, and R. Springer Science & Business Media.

 

Thank you very much for your review. We appreciate very much your comment. The justification for this methodology is applied to the implementation of a standard requirement according to iso50001 and iso50006, where the baseline is the main tool for planning a management system, actually tools are given to solve these needs. Although the standard is recommended, it does not develop the mathematical models and schemes, to normalize the variables involved in the production and implementation of a baseline.

To clarify this idea we have added a paragraph on line 163

“The proposed methodology is focused on the standardization of production data to establish a baseline in accordance with regulatory requirements. These are necessary elements for finding energy consumption references that make it possible to establish savings targets, evaluate the balance between consumption and efficient technology, as well as implement energy indicators to evaluate energy performance and reduce emissions in the establishment of a SGEn management system. This would complete the SFA or DEA production boundaries models that are useful in determining an organization's overall efficiency and its connection to both production and efficiency aspects, as well as market assessments and benchmarking”

 

The paper needs a complete review and carefull explanation of the case study. There is no reference to the case study in the abstract, and it is not clear why authors choose Colombia as reference country. In fact, there are few mentions about Colombia in the whole paper. Also, the industrial sector (plastic industry) is not justified. 

thank you very much for this comment. We have introduced more mentions about Colombia. In order to justify why the study on the plastics industry, we have added  paragraphs on line 27, line 344 and line 395.

Line 27

“The EBL provides a reduction in energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions in a sector such as plastics, which accounts for 15% of Colombia's manufacturing GDP”

Line 344

This is due to the energy costs of the injection machines in the factory, which can be about 60% of the total consumption of the facility, according to studies carried out in Colombia

Line 395

. “In particular, for a sector such as plastics, which in Colombia represents a high energy consumption and an increasing growth for the country's economy”

 

It is difficult to follow the research line in the paper. Some references to figures are wrong. Fig 1 and Fig 2 are repeated and along the paper there are references to figures 8 and 9 that are missing. I think that the figures are not properly listed, and recommend to check it.

Thank you very much for this comment, Figure 4, and paragraph 249-254 were deleted, readjusting the designation of the figures

The saving potential figures are only presented in the last two lines of the paper (last parragraph of Conclusions). The conclusions section is not a place for showing new results.

These last results have been moved to line 359. thank you very much for this comment

I recommend to justify some of the figures presented along the paper. For instance, in line 36 there si a reference of 2% without further explanation. Similar in line 40 with a 25%.

Thank you very much for this comment. We have reviewed the paper again and all figures shown, have been referenced to their source

A full review of tipo error is required. In the title there is a mistake (descarbonization instead of decarbonization).

I am sorry for this mistake. It is correct already.

 

Reviewer 3 Report

In the submitted manuscript, a new energy-baseline methodology is developed for industrial decarbonization in plastic manufacturing process. The manuscript is in general well organized and it would be of interest to the research community in this field of work as it offers results that are of not only theoretical value, but also useful in practice. For instance, the investigation and the drawn conclusions would support developers and engineers in their work. The highlight of the paper is the developed model, the performed experimental investigations and the impact of the obtained results.

In order to improve the readability and clarity of the manuscript, a few minor remarks need to be addressed before the paper is to be accepted for publishing:

1) English needs to be improved throughout the paper. In certain places a better choice of words could be made and also certain places in the text demand better ordering of words. What the authors mean under “descarbonization” in the title? – Did they want to write ““decarbonization”? It should be checked!

2) All the references of equations in the text are missing! Please complete the text with Equation (1)…(9) as references!

3) The font size on more figures (especially the text on Figures 1 and 3) should be increased for better readability!

4) The introduction section should be extended more. There are many other research results in this field that should be mentioned by the authors as research backgrounds in the “Introduction” section of the paper. By this way the “Introduction” and also the “References” sections of this paper should be completed with the under mention relevant references especially that relates to this field:

 

[10] Wang, H.; Chen, W.Y. Modelling deep decarbonization of industrial energy consumption under 2-degree target: Comparing China, India and Western Europe. Applyed Energy 2019, 238, 1563-1572.

 

[11] Kassai, M. Experimental investigation of carbon dioxide cross-contamination in sorption energy recovery wheel in ventilation system. Building Services Engineering Research & Technology 2018, 39(4), 463-474.

Please put these references into the text of the following added sentence (in line 56):

 

“The measures implemented in the industrial sector, and focused on reducing the use of energy in the facilities and associated carbon emissions, are framed within the context of the national and international policies and initiatives, which combine the bases for the economic growth of the country to be carried out with sustainable development [10-11].”

 

[19] Barrett, J.; Cooper, T.; Hammond, G.P.; Pidgeon, N. Industrial energy, materials and products: UK decarbonisation challenges and opportunities 2018, 136, 643-656.

 

[20] Kassai, M., Simonson, C.J. Experimental effectiveness investigation of liquid-to-air membrane energy exchangers under low heat capacity rates conditions. Experimental Heat Transfer 2016, 29(4), 445-455.

Please put these references into the text of the following added sentence (in line 70):

“It is estimated that the standard, applied to different economic sectors, could influence savings of up to 60% in the worldwide energy consumption [17-20].”

 

Please complete the References section of your paper with these referred papers: with numbers [10]; [11]; [19]; [20] references!

5) The reference style of the “References“ section of the recent paper does not meet with the requirements of the journal. Please check the relating formal requirements in the “guide for authors” again and correct it following the instructions!

To improve the paper based on these minor modifications are very significant to have success in acceptance for publication!

Thank you for your consideration in advance!

Author Response

In the submitted manuscript, a new energy-baseline methodology is developed for industrial decarbonization in plastic manufacturing process. The manuscript is in general well organized and it would be of interest to the research community in this field of work as it offers results that are of not only theoretical value, but also useful in practice. For instance, the investigation and the drawn conclusions would support developers and engineers in their work. The highlight of the paper is the developed model, the performed experimental investigations and the impact of the obtained results.

In order to improve the readability and clarity of the manuscript, a few minor remarks need to be addressed before the paper is to be accepted for publishing:

1) English needs to be improved throughout the paper. In certain places a better choice of words could be made and also certain places in the text demand better ordering of words. What the authors mean under “descarbonization” in the title? – Did they want to write ““decarbonization”? It should be checked!

I am sorry for this mistake. We have reviewed the paper again. Thank You very much for this comment.

2) All the references of equations in the text are missing! Please complete the text with Equation (1)…(9) as references!

Thank you very much for this comment. We have corrected it

3) The font size on more figures (especially the text on Figures 1 and 3) should be increased for better readability!

We have adjusted the size for better reading. Thank you very much

4) The introduction section should be extended more. There are many other research results in this field that should be mentioned by the authors as research backgrounds in the “Introduction” section of the paper. By this way the “Introduction” and also the “References” sections of this paper should be completed with the under mention relevant references especially that relates to this field:

 

[10] Wang, H.; Chen, W.Y. Modelling deep decarbonization of industrial energy consumption under 2-degree target: Comparing China, India and Western Europe. Applyed Energy 2019, 238, 1563-1572.

 

[11] Kassai, M. Experimental investigation of carbon dioxide cross-contamination in sorption energy recovery wheel in ventilation system. Building Services Engineering Research & Technology 2018, 39(4), 463-474.

Please put these references into the text of the following added sentence (in line 56):

 

“The measures implemented in the industrial sector, and focused on reducing the use of energy in the facilities and associated carbon emissions, are framed within the context of the national and international policies and initiatives, which combine the bases for the economic growth of the country to be carried out with sustainable development [10-11].”

 

[19] Barrett, J.; Cooper, T.; Hammond, G.P.; Pidgeon, N. Industrial energy, materials and products: UK decarbonisation challenges and opportunities 2018, 136, 643-656.

 

[20] Kassai, M., Simonson, C.J. Experimental effectiveness investigation of liquid-to-air membrane energy exchangers under low heat capacity rates conditions. Experimental Heat Transfer 2016, 29(4), 445-455.

Please put these references into the text of the following added sentence (in line 70):

“It is estimated that the standard, applied to different economic sectors, could influence savings of up to 60% in the worldwide energy consumption [17-20].”

 

Please complete the References section of your paper with these referred papers: with numbers [10]; [11]; [19]; [20] references!

Thank you very much for your comment. We have added two paragraphs to include all this important information that will help clarify the paper. Line 64 and line 89

Lines 64-74

“The decarbonization of industrial energy consumption is critical to the mitigation of global climate change, which could present multiple challenges, particularly for regions in the early stages of industrialization that are committed to reducing energy consumption under 2-degree targets (Wang & Chen, 2019). Countries such as the United Kingdom (UK), have launched a transition to a low-carbon economy and society, by aiming to reduce their "greenhouse gas" (GHG) emissions and decarbonisation, while improving productivity and creating employment opportunities (Barrett, Cooper, Hammond, & Pidgeon, 2018).”

 

Lines 89-91

“Recent studies show advances in the use of technology to contribute to the decarbonization of both the industrial and service sectors, regarding indoor air quality in places such as: schools, offices, and public institutions”

 

5) The reference style of the “References“ section of the recent paper does not meet with the requirements of the journal. Please check the relating formal requirements in the “guide for authors” again and correct it following the instructions!

Thank you very much for this comment, and I apologize for this mistake. It has been corrected

To improve the paper based on these minor modifications are very significant to have success in acceptance for publication!

Thank you very much for all your time and every comment in this review. We very much appreciate your review.

 

 

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Thank you for the new version of the manuscript. I appreciate the effort done improving the Introduction section and review of Figures and Tables.

However there are some parts of the document that still need improvement.

1. Authors assume the linear regression model as the best reference for energy baseline. I am not an expert on ISO standards, but the average is not the proper reference for giving a performance reference. Also, the linear assumption is too strong and does not allow the possibility of non-constant return to scale. As the paper is fully based on the linear regressions, (that is a parametric analysis) and ISO standards, it does not make sense to change now. However, I recommend you to include as future research opportunity to implement non-parametric frontier analysis to improve the methodology and provide a more realistic energy baseline. I suggest you to mention the following paper to shed light about non-parametric frontier techniques.

Gómez-Calvet, R., Conesa, D., Gómez-Calvet, A. R., & Tortosa-Ausina, E. (2014). Energy efficiency in the European Union: What can be learned from the joint application of directional distance functions and slacks-based measures?. Applied energy, 132, 137-154.

2. The reference section requires a careful review. There is a table in the middle of the section (between the first and second reference). Current [9] reference has a missing full stop. Reference [13] should start with capital letter. [23] this and other journal names are short names. You could use full names, or short names, but keep the same rule in the whole section. [24] has a missing space. [39] RStudio is not a statistical software.. RStudio is a R Project IDE. Instead, you should give credit to R Project team, that is:

R Core Team (2017). R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. URL https://www.R-project.org/.

Please, check all the reference section.

I have also found some acronyms like EnMS (line 100) that are not mentioned before. Does it mean Energy Management System? Please clarify.

 

Author Response

Thank you for the new version of the manuscript. I appreciate the effort done improving the Introduction section and review of Figures and Tables.

Thank you very much for your time in reviewing this paper.

However there are some parts of the document that still need improvement.

1. Authors assume the linear regression model as the best reference for energy baseline. I am not an expert on ISO standards, but the average is not the proper reference for giving a performance reference. Also, the linear assumption is too strong and does not allow the possibility of non-constant return to scale. As the paper is fully based on the linear regressions, (that is a parametric analysis) and ISO standards, it does not make sense to change now. However, I recommend you to include as future research opportunity to implement non-parametric frontier analysis to improve the methodology and provide a more realistic energy baseline. I suggest you to mention the following paper to shed light about non-parametric frontier techniques.

Gómez-Calvet, R., Conesa, D., Gómez-Calvet, A. R., & Tortosa-Ausina, E. (2014). Energy efficiency in the European Union: What can be learned from the joint application of directional distance functions and slacks-based measures?. Applied energy, 132, 137-154.

Thank you very much for this comment.

In order to improve the quality of the paper we have added the following paragraph, together with the reference provided.

“The implementation of the methodology introduced above to establish baselines in the industry, complemented by non-parametric frontier analysis, provides an overall analysis of the scope for improving energy efficiency. In this case, it focuses on a sector with high energy consumption, such as the plastics industry. Therefore, it is relevant, in order to establish the fulfillment of energy targets defined in the country.”

 

2. The reference section requires a careful review. There is a table in the middle of the section (between the first and second reference). Current [9] reference has a missing full stop. Reference [13] should start with capital letter. [23] this and other journal names are short names. You could use full names, or short names, but keep the same rule in the whole section. [24] has a missing space. [39] RStudio is not a statistical software.. RStudio is a R Project IDE. Instead, you should give credit to R Project team, that is:

R Core Team (2017). R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. URL https://www.R-project.org/.

Please, check all the reference section.

Thank you very much for this comment. All references and mistakes have been checked and corrected.

I have also found some acronyms like EnMS (line 100) that are not mentioned before. Does it mean Energy Management System? Please clarify.

Thank you very much. It's been corrected.

Thank you for your comments to help us improve the quality of the research work