Development and application of methodologies to get Sustainable industrial systems

This thesis aims to develop and apply methodologies to get sustainable industrial systems. Three tools, included in the scope of Life Cycle Thinking, are considered for this purpose: Best Available Technique (BAT) Analysis, Material and Energy Flow Analysis (MEFA), and process simulation. All these tools are individually analysed and validated in different real case studies, so that their advantages and limitations can be identified and overcome in the proposal of three methodologies that differently combine them. The nexus between the combined tools are the Improvable Flows (IF), defined during this work as those material or energy flows whose management in the considered process is not optimised, and can be improved from a sustainable point of view. The results are integrated methodologies that thoroughly analyse the considered process, identify the potential IF, propose alternatives to enhance such flows and, in some cases, evaluate the suitability and the potential benefits of the proposed alternatives

Design of a sustainable house including the requisites of the Spanish Regulation

Abstract: Green Building is a philosophy aiming to maintain a high quality of the built environment while optimizing the use of resources, both materials and energy. Related to green building, sustainable construction consists in the creation and operation of a healthy built environment giving rise to high-performance green buildings. These building concepts have already been taken into account by the European Union (EU) that has promoted the use of alternative energies, thermal insulation and responsible consumption programs, among others. The Directive 2002/91/EC came into force to regulate energy efficiency in new buildings. Member States transposed this text to their legal systems, considering the particularities of to their territories, geography, economy and society. In Spain, the Spanish Technical Building Code (CTE-Código Técnico de Edificación) promotes sustainable building. Other regulations regarding energy buildings certification, energy efficiency or renewable energy promotion have already been adopted. This work presents a house designed taking into account some aspects of the sustainable house design, and compares it with a reference house. These aspects include the thermal requirements of the house following a simplified option established in the basic documents HE1 (Limitation of the energetic demand) and HE4 (Minimal solar contribution for heating domestic water) of the Spanish Building Technical Cod