Search Results (15)

Omni-channel retailers arise to address the deficiencies in consumers’ online shopping experiences; the resulting competition between such retailers and traditional online platforms presents substantial challenges for green product manufacturers. A three-level game model is established to examine a manufacturer’s green contract design (product pricing and greenness determination) and mode selection under the competition between an online platform and a new retailer providing omni-channel services to end customers. The manufacturer can select between two modes: supplying a green product to the online platform and new retailer (mode RR) or selling it directly through the online platform and reselling it to the new retailer (mode PR). Our findings indicate that, first, even if the relationship between the manufacturer and new retailer has changed from cooperation under mode RR to competition and cooperation under mode PR, the manufacturer still favors two-channel sales over single-channel sales and affects consumer channel choices to adjust market shares through mode selection. Second, regarding the impacts of the key parameters on the manufacturer, downstream e-commerce platform retailers and environment are intricate and nuanced. While raising the omni-channel service level enhances profitability in the new retailer across both modes, its environmental impacts differ significantly between them. Additionally, it can harm the online platform in some cases. Nevertheless, when the parameters fall within suitable ranges, the manufacturer and both downstream retailers have a consistent preference for improved omni-channel services under both modes. Finally, there is a significant divergence in mode preferences among the manufacturer and both downstream platform retailers. Due to the first-mover advantage, the manufacturer opts for mode RR over mode PR in most cases. Notably, within a specific range of parameters, they consistently prefer mode RR, which also proves beneficial for the environment, resulting in a Pareto optimal outcome. This proposes a concrete cooperation mechanism among the manufacturer, retailers, and consumers from quantitative insights, which can promote green products to achieve the objective of low-carbon environmental protection. Full article

With water scarcity becoming worse, and demand increasing, the urgency for the water industry to hit net-zero carbon is accelerating. Even as a multitude of utilities have pledged to reach net-zero by 2050, advancing beyond the energy–water nexus remains a heavy lift. This paper, using a systematic literature review that complies with Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA), aims to propose sustainable water resource management (SWRM) strategies that may assist water utilities in decarbonizing their value chains and achieving net-zero carbon. In total, 31 articles were included from SCOPUS, ResearchGate, ScienceDirect, and Springer. The findings show that water utilities are responsible for 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions and could reduce these emissions by more than 45% by employing a few strategies, including the electrification of transport fleets, the use of renewables, advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) and energy-efficient technologies. A broad-based case study from Scottish Water shows a 254,000-ton CO₂ reduction in the period since 2007, indicative of the potential of these measures. The review concludes that net-zero carbon is feasible through a mix of decarbonization, wastewater reuse, smart systems and policy-led innovation, especially if customized to both large and small utilities. To facilitate a wider and a more scalable transition, research needs to focus on development of low-cost and flexible strategies for underserved utilities. Full article

In the current context of severe environmental challenges and climate change, the low-carbon green development model has become an international consensus. This study establishes a green supply chain duopoly competition model, considering two types of government subsidies and data-driven marketing (DDM) to help achieve supply chain development. The aim of the research is to explore how to provide green subsidies, enhance green levels, maintain competitive advantage, and improve profits in supply chain enterprises with inconsistent green levels. The study discusses the impact of green consumer preferences, market competition, and DDM quality on the profits of supply chain enterprises. It also analyzes how to use supply chain contracts to achieve coordination and optimization within the supply chain. The findings are summarized as follows. (1) As consumer preferences for green products increase, the unit subsidy model continues to enhance performance and market share more effectively than the total subsidy model. (2) The unit subsidy model requires a more relaxed subsidy coefficient, making it easier for enterprises to develop without needing high subsidies. It consistently achieves better total performance, particularly with improved DDM quality. (3) Manufacturers and retailers can achieve a win–win situation through internal coordination of the supply chain via wholesale price contracts. (4) Under certain conditions, consumers more sensitive to green products will increase the product pricing of both M1 and M2. The level of greenness of M2 will also increase. But also, the wholesale and retail prices of M1 will decrease because of the effect of DDM. (5) The effect of the intensity of market competition on pricing decisions is more complex. Under certain conditions, the market competition coefficient has a positive impact on the pricing of M1 and a negative impact on the pricing and green level of M2. This can be changed due to an increase in the level of DDM quality, where an increase in the market competition coefficient results in lower pricing for M1 and higher pricing for M2. The green level for M2 is also improved. In addition, the improvement in DDM quality consistently has a positive impact on pricing decisions and green levels for M2. Pricing decisions for M1 are affected differently, depending on the customer’s sensitivity to DDM. Full article

The technology options for sustainable development are explored with customer low-carbon preference in a port supply chain consisting of one ship and one port. Port supply chains can opt for either shower power or low-sulfur fuel oil to cut down emissions. We set game models considering three power structures: the port dominant (port-led Stackelberg game), the ship dominant (ship-led Stackelberg game), and the port and ship on the same footing (Nash game). We compare the performances of different technologies. It is shown that, when customer low-carbon preference and carbon tax are both low, LSFO is the appropriate choice from the supply chain’s profit perspective, SP is preferred from the emission control perspective, and LSFO is preferred from the social welfare perspective. However, when customers’ low-carbon preferences, carbon tax, and environmental concerns are all low or all high, LSFO should be adopted from the view of social welfare. The profits and carbon emissions of the supply chain in the Nash game are higher than those in the Stackelberg game. While the environmental concern is low, the social welfare of the supply chain in the Nash game is greater than that in the Stackelberg game. Otherwise, it is less than that in the Stackelberg game. The obtained results can help governments formulate policies and ships make emission reduction technology decisions according to their own interests. Full article

Under the background of the “dual carbon” targets and continuously promoted power system reform, the application of a high proportion of renewable energy is becoming increasingly widespread. All sectors of society have greater demands for more appropriate electricity sales packages to guide the behavior of power users, which will in turn help conserve energy, reduce emissions, and finally achieve low-carbon operation of the power market economy. However, the existing methods of recommending electricity sales packages fail to provide appropriate and accurate recommendations for the users lacking preference information. Therefore, this paper proposes a two-sided matching decision-making method of an electricity sales package based on disappointment theory. First of all, according to the incomplete fuzzy preference relationship provided by the power user and the electricity sales package, the respective priority weight vector is calculated, and then the subjective satisfaction matrix of the power user and the electricity sales package is calculated. Next, the adjusted satisfaction matrix is calculated by adding the influence of the theory of elation and disappointment. Then, on the basis of the adjusted satisfaction matrix, an optimization model aiming at maximizing the total satisfaction of electric power customers and electricity sales packages is established, and the optimal stable matching model of electric power customers and electricity sales packages is obtained. Lastly, taking an industrial park in Zhejiang Province as an example, using the bilateral matching method proposed in this article, the optimal matching schemes for five electric power customers and six electricity sales packages is obtained, which shows the effectiveness and rationality of the two-sided matching decision-making method of electricity sales packages based on the disappointment theory. Full article

This paper considers a fresh food supply chain with a supplier who takes responsibility for the cold chain and a retailer who needs to reprocess the fresh food. Carbon emissions will be produced in the processes of production, transportation, processing, etc. We consider the four-stage game, obtain the function expressions of optimal market prices with respect to carbon emission reduction level (CERL), analyze the best responses of the supplier and the retailer regarding their CERLs, and obtain the 25 optimal CERLs under competitive equilibrium. In 24 of the 25 equilibrium cases, the supplier or the retailer either do nothing to reduce carbon emissions, or make the most effort to reduce carbon emissions. Excluding these special cases, we focused on a non-trivial case where the increasing consumer preferences for low-carbon products will encourage the supplier and the retailer to reduce carbon emissions. Interestingly, we find that when the consumer preference for low-carbon products is low, the retailer’s and supplier’s equilibrium carbon reduction levels are low, so that the potential market size is small such that the competition for two kinds of customers is fierce. Then, an increase in the sale cost will reduce the retail price. However, when the consumer preference for low-carbon products is high, the potential market size is large such that the competition is not fierce. Then, an increase in the sale cost will advance the retail price. Full article

Novel or unconventional technologies are critical to providing cost-competitive natural gas supplies to meet rising demands and provide more opportunities to develop low-quality gas fields with high contaminants, including high carbon dioxide (CO₂) fields. High nitrogen concentrations that reduce the heating value of gaseous products are typically associated with high CO₂ fields. Consequently, removing nitrogen is essential for meeting customers’ requirements. The intensification approach with a rotating packed bed (RPB) demonstrated considerable potential to remove nitrogen from natural gas under cryogenic conditions. Moreover, the process significantly reduces the equipment size compared to the conventional distillation column, thus making it more economical. The prediction model developed in this study employed artificial neural networks (ANN) based on data from in-house experiments due to a lack of available data. The ANN model is preferred as it offers easy processing of large amounts of data, even for more complex processes, compared to developing the first principal mathematical model, which requires numerous assumptions and might be associated with lumped components in the kinetic model. Backpropagation algorithms for ANN Lavenberg–Marquardt (LM), scaled conjugate gradient (SCG), and Bayesian regularisation (BR) were also utilised. Resultantly, the LM produced the best model for predicting nitrogen removal from natural gas compared to other ANN models with a layer size of nine, with a 99.56% regression (R²) and 0.0128 mean standard error (MSE). Full article

The need to mitigate the impacts of climate change has been a worldwide consensus. Cap and trade regulations have been introduced to make the world achieve carbon peaks and neutrality. There are also growing concerns regarding low carbon management. Considering both cap and trade regulations and low-carbon preferences from customers, this study focuses on reducing carbon emissions and pricing decisions in the dual-channel supply chain based on game theory. Furthermore, it analyzes the effects of low-carbon preference (LCP) on emission-reduction efforts and the profits of supply chain members. Finally, it investigates the impact of promoting low-carbon products on optimal decisions and profits. The results conclude that (1) the growth of customers’ LCP level motivates the manufacturer to have more investment in emission reduction with the BOPS unit compensation or full-sales transfer mode; (2) the increase in customers’ LCP level would benefit the supply chain members; (3) the joint emission-reduction strategy can strengthen the positive impact of LCP level on the manufacturer’s emission-reduction effort and the profits supply chain members; and (4) the joint emission-reduction strategy is preferable for the supply chain members compared to the single emission-reduction strategy. However, the joint emission strategy is not always better than the single emission strategy with respect to the selling price. Finally, it provides managerial implications for decision-makers and potential issues for future research. Full article

Rapid and even disruptive innovations are needed to make cities fit for the future. The particular challenge will be to transform existing urban spaces in order to increase climate resilience. Along these lines, rainwater harvesting has taken place insufficiently to date, even when Sponge City concepts are implemented. Thus, the concept presented here addresses existing urban neighborhoods and proposes to collect rainwater from nearby rooftops and treat it in decentral treatment units called “City Water Hubs” (CWH) equipped with modular coupled low-energy technologies to produce various customized “City Water” qualities, and store it until it can be used or distributed. A feasibility study with a focus on the campus area at the main building of the Leibniz University of Hannover, the determined rainwater qualities, and the results from investigations with two laboratory test plants provided the basis for the technical design of the pursued concept. The feasibility study showed how sufficient rainwater for irrigation purposes can be made available for the listed large university park even under extreme dry and heat wave conditions. If large portions of the roof area (11,737 m²) of the university’s main building were activated, even in a dry year with only 49.8% of the average precipitation, only 19.8% of the harvested stormwater would be needed for irrigation. The rainwater samples showed TSS concentrations of up to 7.54 mg/L, COD of up to 58.5 mg/L, and NH₄ of up to 2.21 mg/L, which was in line with data reported in the literature. The treatment technologies used for the two pilot plants are proven approaches for stormwater treatment and were composed as follows: (1) gravity-driven membrane filtration (GDM) and (2) slow sand filter with integrated activated carbon (AC) layer. The treatment with both (1) and (2) clearly improved the rainwater quality. The GDM reduced turbidity by 90.4% and the Sand/AC filter by 20.4%. With regard to COD, the studies for GDM did not show a clear elimination trend; the Sand/AC filter reduced the COD by 77%. Taken together, decentralized low-energy rainwater treatment can reliably provide quality-assured City Water for any specific use. Regarding the treatment design, GDM is preferable and can be better operated with downstream UV disinfection, which might be needed to reduce the pathogenic load, e.g., for local heat control measures. The research steps presented here will pioneer the development of a city-wide rainwater harvesting infrastructure on the way of establishing stormwater as a resource for a new wing of urban water supply. The presented findings will now result in the implementation of a full-scale CHW on the campus to ensure long-term irrigation of the listed park, relieving the public drinking water supply. Full article

The choice of emission control technology in a port supply chain under a cap-and-trade scheme considering low-carbon preferences of customers, is explored in this study. In port areas, the port supply chain consisting of one port and one ship can adopt either shore power (SP) or low sulfur fuel oil (LSFO) to reduce emissions. The economic and social performance of the port supply chain when either SP or LSFO is implemented is compared under three different game models (port-leader Stackelberg game, ship-leader Stackelberg game and the Nash game). The obtained results show that the profits and emissions in the Nash game are higher than those in the other two games. When environmental concern is relatively small, social welfare in the Nash game is the highest, while social welfare in the one-party-dominant structure is superior to that in the Nash structure, under high environmental concern. When the customers’ low-carbon preferences and carbon prices are low, both the supply chain’s profits and carbon emissions when LSFO is used are higher than those from using SP. From the perspective of social welfare maximization, in general, LSFO is preferred when carbon price, customers’ low-carbon preference and environmental concern are all low or are all high. Otherwise, SP is the optimal decision. The findings can provide insights for governments in formulating emission control policies according to their own interests. Full article

This paper investigates the incentives of firms to share demand information in two competing supply chains. We consider a model in which each supply chain consists of a manufacturer and a retailer, and the manufacturers decide their products’ carbon emissions reduction levels. Through information sharing, manufacturers can adjust their wholesale price and the level of carbon emissions reduction according to the demand signal. The results reveal that information sharing always benefits the manufacturer. Information-sharing arrangements are more likely to occur when the manufacturer’s carbon emissions reduction efficiency or the customer’s low-carbon product preference is relatively high. Moreover, under Cournot competition, the retailer’s incentive to share information increases when information is less accurate or the competition is less intense. By sharing demand information, manufacturers will invest more in reducing the carbon emissions of their products. Therefore, there are two effects of information sharing: the “economic effect” on the benefits of all parties and the “environmental effect” on reducing carbon emissions. Our findings highlight the economic and environmental incentives of information sharing in the supply chain and the synthesis impacts of low-carbon preferences, efficiency of carbon emissions reduction, and the competition intensity on the retailer’s incentives to share information. Full article

This paper studies a low-carbon dual-channel supply chain in which a manufacturer sells products through the direct channel and traditional channel, and a retailer sells products through the traditional channel. The manufacturer considers carbon emission reduction and has fairness concern behavior. The retailer provides sales service in the traditional channel and considers fairness concern behavior. The objective of this paper is to analyze the effects of different parameter values on the price stability and utility of the supply chain system emphatically using 2D bifurcation diagram, parameter plot basin, the basins of attraction, chaos attractor and sensitivity to the initial value, etc. The results find that the retailer’s fairness concern behavior shrinks the stability of the supply chain system more than that of the manufacturer’s fairness concern behavior. The system stability region decreases with the increase of carbon emission reduction level and the retailer’s fairness concern. The customers’ preference for the direct channel decreases the stable range of the direct channel, while it enlarges the stable range of the traditional channel. The supply chain system enters into chaos through flip bifurcation with the increase of price adjustment speed. In a stable state, the manufacture improving customer’s preference for the direct channel and the retailer choosing the appropriate fairness concern level can achieve the maximum utility separately. In a chaotic state, the average utilities of the manufacturer and retailer all decline, while that of the retailer declines even more. By selecting appropriate control parameter, the low-carbon dual-channel supply chain system can return to a stable state from chaos again. The research of this paper is of great significance to price decisions of participants and supply chain operation management. Full article

This study investigates the preferences of Italian home-owners when choosing a new domestic heating system. The focus is on understanding the influence on consumer choice of a potential label certifying the effect of the heating system on the greenhouse effect. To this end, we designed a survey including a discrete choice experiment and administered it to residents in north-eastern Italy. Our findings reveal that, on average, respondents pay particular attention to the green effect of their purchase. The carbon dioxide reduction label was considered second in terms of importance after cost. Further analysis found that our sample presents three clusters of customers, with intra-cluster homogeneous preferences. The cluster analysis showed that while the initial system costs are considered to varying degrees by the whole sample, the carbon dioxide reduction label was considered important by 79% of respondents (members of clusters 1 and 2). To achieve greater results in reducing the greenhouse effect of the domestic heating sector, a combination of policies should be used simultaneously to achieve greater effectiveness. Our simulations support the hypothesis that policymakers should achieve greater results in terms of reducing the domestic greenhouse gas emissions by applying a combined policy that leverages the importance citizens accord to the different characteristics of a heating system. From our results, the application of a ‘low carbon dioxide ( $C{O}_2$ ) emissions’ label will amplify the effect of a subsidy that reduces the initial system costs. Full article

Consumers cannot fully assess the quality of remanufactured products prior to purchase. To reduce consumer risk, closed-loop supply chains adopt a warranty strategy to enhance perceived value among customers and stimulate green growth. Based on Stackelberg game theory and considering consumers’ low-carbon and remanufactured product preferences, this paper aims to explore the decision-making efficiency of closed-loop supply chains with warranty services. The results of the study show that consumers’ confidence in purchasing remanufactured products has increased the demand for new products and remanufactured products, in turn also increasing the interest of the member companies of the supply chain, and stimulating the realization of the potential value of remanufacturing, which is conducive to green growth. When a remanufactured product warranty period meets certain conditions, the member companies of the supply chain can obtain optimal profit. The optimal warranty entity selection of a closed-loop supply chain with a warranty service depends on the warranty efficiency of each entity, thus making it necessary to examine the products of each warranty party. Full article

With increasingly stringent environmental regulations on emission standards, enterprises and investigators are looking for effective ways to decrease GHG emission from products. As an important method for reducing GHG emission of products, low-carbon product family design has attracted more and more attention. Existing research, related to low-carbon product family design, did not take into account remanufactured products. Nowadays, it is popular to launch remanufactured products for environmental benefit and meeting customer needs. On the one hand, the design of remanufactured products is influenced by product family design. On the other hand, the launch of remanufactured products may cannibalize the sale of new products. Thus, the design of remanufactured products should be considered together with the product family design for obtaining the maximum profit and reducing the GHG emission as soon as possible. The purpose of this paper is to present an optimization model to concurrently determine product family design, remanufactured products planning and remanufacturing parameters selection with consideration of the customer preference, the total profit of a company and the total GHG emission from production. A genetic algorithm is applied to solve the optimization problem. The proposed method can help decision-makers to simultaneously determine the design of a product family and remanufactured products with a better trade-off between profit and environmental impact. Finally, a case study is performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the presented approach. Full article