Despite the critical importance of ecological systems for sustaining all chemical and manufacturing processes, process design has kept nature outside its system boundary. Recent efforts for sustainable process design aim to reduce environmental impact, but no design method considers the capacity of ecosystems to supply the goods and services that are needed to sustain a process. Overcoming this deficiency of conventional process design is essential to transform the chemical industry into an activity that respects ecological constraints and results in a net positive societal impact. As an important step toward meeting this goal, this work expands the boundary of process design to include ecosystems as unit operations in traditional design. Similar to tasks performed by conventional unit operations, ecological processes perform ecosystem functions resulting in goods and services required by the technological system. The goal behind designing integrated techno‐ecological process flowsheets is to balance the ecosystem service demand of technological systems with the ecosystem service supply of ecological systems. Systems are optimized to balance the demand and supply subject to unit operation level constraints of technological and ecological systems, and interactions between detailed process level variables and ecological variables are explored. The Techno‐Ecological Synergy (TES) Design method is developed and applied to a biofuel production system, considering ecosystem services like water provisioning and water quality regulation provided by wetland ecosystems. Comparing the integrated TES design with conventional techno‐centric design shows that TES design can result in net positive impact manufacturing: a case where the ecosystem service supply is equal to or exceeds the demand, with little or no compromises in process profitability. These results should encourage close integration between technological and ecological systems while designing sustainable processes, and identify many challenges for developing TES of individual processes and across the life cycle. © 2018 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 64: 2390–2407, 2018

中文翻译：

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生态系统作为本地技术与生态协同作用的单元操作：具有处理湿地的集成过程设计

尽管生态系统对于维持所有化学和制造过程至关重要，但是过程设计却使自然界处于其系统范围之外。可持续过程设计的最新努力旨在减少对环境的影响，但是没有一种设计方法考虑到生态系统提供维持过程所需的商品和服务的能力。克服常规工艺设计的这种缺陷对于将化学工业转变为尊重生态约束并产生净积极的社会影响的活动至关重要。作为实现此目标的重要一步，这项工作扩展了流程设计的范围，将生态系统作为传统设计中的单元操作纳入其中。与常规单位操作执行的任务类似，生态过程执行生态系统功能，从而产生技术系统所需的商品和服务。设计集成的技术生态过程流程图的目的是平衡技术系统的生态系统服务需求与生态系统的生态系统服务供给之间的平衡。优化系统以在技术和生态系统的单位操作级别约束下平衡供需，并探索详细的过程级别变量和生态变量之间的相互作用。考虑到湿地生态系统提供的水供应和水质调节等生态系统服务，开发了技术-生态协同（TES）设计方法并将其应用于生物燃料生产系统。将集成的TES设计与传统的以技术为中心的设计进行比较，表明TES设计可以带来净的积极影响制造：在这种情况下，生态系统服务供应等于或超过需求，而工艺利润几乎没有或没有任何妥协。这些结果应鼓励在设计可持续流程的同时鼓励技术与生态系统之间的紧密集成，并确定在开发单个流程和整个生命周期的TES时面临的许多挑战。©2018美国化学工程师学会 这些结果应鼓励在设计可持续流程的同时鼓励技术与生态系统之间的紧密集成，并确定在开发单个流程和整个生命周期的TES时面临的许多挑战。©2018美国化学工程师学会 这些结果应鼓励在设计可持续流程的同时鼓励技术与生态系统之间的紧密集成，并确定在开发单个流程和整个生命周期的TES时面临的许多挑战。©2018美国化学工程师学会AIChE J，64：2390–2407，2018