Journal of Cleaner Production 163 (2017) 49e57

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Journal of Cleaner Production

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jclepro

Evaluation of cleaner production technology integration for the

Chinese herbal medicine industry using carbon flow analysis
Xiaoyan Meng a, Zongguo Wen a, *, Yi Qian a, Hongbing Yu b
a
State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control (SKLESPC), College of Environment, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
b
College of Environmental Science & Engineering, Energy Saving and Cleaner Production Research Center of “985 Project” in Circular Economy,
Philosophy and Social Sciences Innovation Base Project, Nankai University, Tianjin 300071, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The manufacturing sector was an early promoter of CO2 mitigation and low-carbon development stra-
Received 13 February 2015 tegies in many countries. The basic unit for these development strategies is enterprises. In order to
Received in revised form quantify their performance on resource saving and emission reduction, this study proposed a carbon
22 August 2015
flow analysis (CFA) approach based on substance flow analysis (SFA). Four special evaluation indicators
Accepted 17 October 2015
Available online 26 October 2015
including the percentage of carbon stored in the product (RC-P), the percentage of carbon as CO2 (RC
CO2 ),
the percentage of carbon in solid waste (RC-SW), and the percentage of carbon in COD (RC-COD) were
developed. A case study was conducted in an herbal medicine plant, which consumes huge amounts of
Keywords:
Low-carbon economy
fossil fuel and discharges 255 tons of biomass waste per year. Cleaner production (CP) technologies were
Bioenergy introduced to achieve low-carbon transformation and the CFA approach was used to evaluate the
Cleaner production effectiveness. After implementing CP technologies, RC-P was 4.23%, 1.65 times higher than before,
Carbon flow analysis meaning that the carbon utilization efficiency of the firm increased by 65%. The RC
CO2 was 62.70%,
Technology assessment meaning that an 11.13% reduction was obtained. The RC-SW increased by 23.05%, and the absolute amount
Industrial biomass waste of carbon in solid waste was reduced by 45.35 tons. If the whole Chinese herbal medicine industry
implemented this CP technology integration, it would save 914,622 tce of fossil fuels, reduce herb residue
discharge by 1.14 million tons and reduce CO2 emissions by 1.72 million tons per year. This research
provided a model and an effective assessment tool for low-carbon transformation of industries that
produce large amounts of biomass waste.
© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction conventional high fossil-carbon economy to low-fossil carbon

In the 21st century, the development and application of envi-
ronmentally friendly technologies especially for reducing fossil-
fuel use and CO2 emission reduction in industries should be
prioritized in sustainable development. According to an ecological
definition, biomass refers to sources of bioenergy and bio-based
materials. These materials can be industrial waste, municipal
solid waste, and agricultural residues or forestry products. They can
also substitute for fossil fuels and reduce the emission of green-
house gases (GHG) (Zheng, 2008; Cheng, 2009).
Biomass life cycles are nearly CO2 neutral or 100% carbon-free
(Liang and Kozinski, 2000). In the transition period from
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: meng-xy13@mails.tsinghua.edu.cn (X. Meng), wenzg@
tsinghua.edu.cn (Z. Wen).
economy, bioenergy; such as bio-oil plays an important role, and its
pollutant reduction effects are highly valued internationally
(Akashi et al., 2012). Currently there are five main methods for
utilizing biomass: direct combustion, hydrolysis liquefaction,
anaerobic digestion for methane, pyrolysis gasification and pyrol-
ysis liquefaction (Benavente et al., 2014; Mohan et al., 2006; Luo
et al., 2004; Uzun and Sariolu, 2009). However, the first three
methods have several shortcomings: low energy efficiency, high
costs and more by-products, as well as being hard to store. In
contrast, pyrolysis liquefaction technology can convert biomass
into fuel products, which have a high energy density and are easy to
store. In addition, the pyrolysis equipment is easy to operate (Ucar
and Ozkan, 2008).
There are various industries, in particular the agricultural
product processing industry, that produce large amounts of
biomass wastes (e.g., sugar cane bagasse, corn cobs, grape marc,
brewery waste and olive mill waste) (Anwar et al., 2014). For

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.10.067
0959-6526/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
50 X. Meng et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 163 (2017) 49e57
example, the Mediterranean region has a high concentration of the
world's wine, olive oil, canned fruits and vegetables industries
(Benavente et al., 2014). Brazil is the world's largest producer of
bioethanol using sugarcane (Petruccioli et al., 2011). Enterprises in
these industries often face similar challenges: a surprising number
of wastes take up a lot of land. These wastes often have high water
content and spoils easily, causing environmental pollution.
The herbal medicine industry is a typical example of these in-
dustries, as it produces huge amounts of biomass waste, called herb
residue. How to reuse this biomass industrial waste is a very urgent,
yet difficult-to-solve problem for enterprises. In order to solve this
problem, pyrolysis liquefaction technology is used in this study to
convert the industrial biomass waste (herb residue) to bio-oil that
can be used in the production process to replace fossil energy. In
addition, other efficient CP technologies such as Ethanol recycling
for the low-carbon development of the herbal medicine industry
have been introduced. Finally, the results of the CP technology
integration have been evaluated in this study.
To date, there are several publications about the quantitative
assessment of CP technology. Fijał (2007) presented a set of profile
indices including raw material, energy, waste, products and
packaging profiles. These indices are used to determine an inte-
grated environmental assessment index of cleaner production
technologies. Tseng et al. (2009) used the fuzzy analytic hierarchy
process (AHP) methodology to discuss the different decision
criteria (e.g., organizing, systems and technologies, measurement
and feedback) for effective CP implementation in PWB
manufacturing in Taiwan. Jia et al. (2014) established a compre-
hensive indicator framework and also used a fuzzy AHP model to
evaluate cleaner production in the vanadium extraction industry.
Basappaji and Nagesha (2014) presented a fuzzy logic approach to
estimate the CP level. A benchmarking approach using two-stage
super-efficient data envelopment analysis (DEA) was used to
assess the cleaner production performance in coal-fired power
plants (Zeng and Ren, 2010). In general, the above methods based
on an integrated index have useful policy implications. But the
index system is rather complex as it contains many numerical
indicators. In addition, it is an empirical model, so if indices or
indices' weights are altered, the assessment results change
significantly. As a result, the evaluation requires a lot of time and
the results were unreliable.
Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a widely used method for eval-
uating the overall environmental impacts of technology
(Medeiros et al., 2015; Bouvart and Prieur, 2009; Hermann et al.,
2007). It focuses on complete life cycle stages and provides
comprehensive evaluations. But there were also some limitations
of LCA in China. For example, it usually needs large amounts of
data which are not easy to obtain. In addition, it evaluates a broad
range of environmental impacts, even though some are unrelated
to the study. It is also unable to assess a system's resource utili-
zation efficiency.
Although there have been studies on the quantitative evaluation
of CP technology, there are few studies conducted from the low-
carbon perspective. Substance flow analysis (SFA) is a branch of
material flow analysis. It is an important tool to present the
metabolism of typical resources or elements at global, national,
regional, industrial park and firm levels (Brunner and Rechberger,
2004). Up to now, SFA studies are concentrated at the national,
regional and industrial park level (Mao et al., 2006; Graedel et al.,
2004; Wen and Meng, 2015). SFA is an effective method to iden-
tify the carbon footprint of industrial processes. The SFA results can
provide evidence for carbon emission management decisions (Yu
et al., 2015). Zhang et al. (2013) presented an analysis of low-
carbon industrial symbiosis (IS) technology for carbon mitigation
in a Chinese iron/steel industrial park. But the research on carbon
flow analysis at enterprise level is still limited. It is widely
acknowledged that there has been little quantitative research that
evaluates CP technologies using carbon flow analysis at the enter-
prise level.
Based on previous studies, as well as the analysis above, it is
necessary to develop a low-carbon technology evaluation approach
which is easy to operate and can assess resource utilization effi-
ciency and carbon emissions for industries that produce large
amounts of biomass waste. Given its carbon-orientation and the
limitations of the above evaluation methods, a carbon flow analysis
approach based on substance flow analysis (SFA) for low-carbon
assessment of CP technology integration at company level is pro-
posed in this study. In order to understand the carbon flow more
clearly, four special indicators have been developed: the percentage
of carbon stored in the product (RC-P) (This shows the carbon uti-
lization efficiency of a system); the percentage of carbon emitted as
CO2 into the atmosphere (RC
CO2 ), the percentage of carbon in COD
(Chemical Oxygen Demand) (RC-COD) and the percentage of carbon
in solid waste (RC-SR); the last three indicators show the carbon
emissions in the environment.
The purpose of this research is to investigate the low-carbon
development model for industries which produce large amounts
of biomass waste. A suitable tool to evaluate the energy and
emission benefits of CP technologies will be developed. This will aid
the decision-making for further technology selection, especially for
industries that produce large amounts of biomass waste like the
herbal medicine industry. The results can help organizations
identify the differences between the desired and current situation,
whether they need to implement CP strategies, and which tech-
nologies to promote. Furthermore, it can help managers find for
improvement, and exploit potential energy savings and pollutant
reduction opportunities.
2. Integration of CP technologies in herbal medicine industry
2.1. The herbal medicine industry in China
The herbal medicine industry is a typical industry that produces
large amounts of biomass waste. China is the birthplace of Chinese
medicine, at present there are nearly 2000 herbal medicine en-
terprises. It produces about 1.5 million tons of solid waste annually
after the extraction of medical active components from natural
plants (Wang et al., 2010). Solid waste, called “herb residue”, spoils
easily and has a powerful stench. It can also be washed into the
surrounding environment via rainfall. Almost all the Chinese herbal
medicine enterprises use fossil fuels directly or indirectly as their
main source of power, which are typical “high carbon” energy
consumption structures and produce large amounts of greenhouse
gases.
Herb residue is the solid that is left over after extracting trace
biological molecules from plants, whose main ingredients are cel-
lulose, hemicellulose and lignin. Therefore it is a common industrial
waste biomass and can be employed as a renewable energy source.
2.2. Basic case enterprise information
The case enterprise is a famous Chinese medicine pharmaceu-
tical enterprise founded in 1944, and located in Tianjin city, in the
northeast of China near the Bohai Bay. It is the largest domestic
manufacturer of dripping pills, and Composite Salvia Dropping Pill
(CSDP) is one of its most important products. The main production
process of CSDP is shown in Fig. 1. Most of the domestic TCM en-
terprises use concentrated leach processing for mass production.
This involves extraction, concentration and alcohol precipitation.
 X. Meng et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 163 (2017) 49e57 51

Pyrolyzing furnace Catalytic furnace

Sanqi Waste packaging
Feeding
Danshen Scattered herbs, dust Herb residue Dehydrated Crushing

Water Extraction, Waste clean water,

Condenser
Incondensable gas
Steam filtration waste stream Residue
collector collection bag

Pyrolysis oil Pyrolysis oil

collector storage Tank Energy use

Filtrate Herb residue

Fig. 2. Herb residue catalytic pyrolysis and resource utilization process flow diagram.

Steam Concentration Condensate wastewater

2.3.2. Pyrolysis for producing bio-oil and resource utilization of

Ethanol Alcohol precipitation Alcohol precipitation residue herb residue
Herb residue pyrolysis is the most important technology in the
CP technology integration scenario. Herb residue is the solid that
Supernatant remains after extracting trace biological small molecules from
Alcohol Chinese medicinal plant materials, whose main ingredients are
cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin. Using pyrolysis liquefaction
Steam Dilute extract Condensate wastewater
technology the herb residue can undergo added value conversion.
Alcohol precipitation residue The bio-oil obtained by direct pyrolysis is unstable, has high ox-
(Containing a small amount of ethanol) ygen content and low calorific value. The upgraded bio-oil
Clean area approach includes many processes, amongst which, catalytic
cracking is the best. This is because it is relatively simple to
Steam Concentration Extract
operate, processing cost is low, and it improves the quality of the
bio-oil.
Experiments were performed on the catalytic pyrolysis of herb
Preparation CSDP residue for bio-oil. The experimental material was fresh salvia
residue obtained from the CSDP production process. Zeolite, mes-
Raw material Process Waste Product
opore molecular sieve and Al2O3 were selected as catalysts. The
Fig. 1. The main production process of Composite Salvia Dropping Pills.
pyrolysis experiments were carried out in a horizontal quartz
reactor which was placed in an electrical furnace. The results
showed that the highest oil yield was 34.26% with a heating value of
24.91 MJ/kg (Meng et al., 2010). Then the bio-oil obtained from herb
2.3. CP technology integration residue pyrolysis was used in the extraction and concentration
sections of the CSDP production process, replacing traditional
2.3.1. CP technology integration for low-carbon orientated CSDP electricity consumption. The herb residue catalytic pyrolysis and
production resource utilization process flow diagram is shown in Fig. 2.
In order to find out how CP should be implemented, a field
survey and CP audit were conducted on the whole CSDP production
process. It found that the main problems are: 3. Method and data for low-carbon assessment

 255 tons of herb residues are produced per year, which takes up
a lot of land and spoils easily.
 The production consumes a huge amount of electricity, which is
generated from the coal and is a “high carbon” energy user.
 Ethanol recovery efficiency needs to be improved
 Other problems, for example, cleaning water is not recycled
The corresponding CP technologies are used to solve the above
problems in CDSP production. The details of each technology are
presented here (see Table 1).
3.1. Carbon flow analysis system boundary
Based on the material flow analysis method, the main produc-
tion process in the herbal medicine enterprise and the
inputeoutput analysis were combined. The system boundary
studied is shown in Fig. 3. The research boundary for carbon flow
analysis contains three main parts: the main raw materials from the
natural systems into the enterprise, the products produced in the
enterprise and the solid, liquid and gas waste discharged into the
environment.

Table 1
Cleaner production technology integration for low-carbon orientated CSDP production.

No. Technology Abbreviation Details

1 Herb residue pyrolysis and utilization
2 Key equipment automatic control
technology
3 Ethanol recovery technology
4 Cleaning waste water recycling
technology
5 Steam condensation water recycling
HRPU Through pyrolysis, herb residue is converted to bio-oil, then the bio-oil replaces fossil fuels
in the extraction and concentration process.
KEAC Automatic cooling control of the circulating water temperature can be implemented by increasing
the temperature sensors, variable frequency drive system, PID regulator, etc.
ER Changed the condenser in the extraction plant to a spiral plate heat exchanger.
CWWR Recycling clean waste water in the production process.
SCWR Closed condensate recovery technology is used to recycle the steam condensation water
in the extraction plant, then the recycled water is used in the boiler room.
52
Inputs Stock
Electricity
(EC)
Steam
Extraction, enrichment,
alcohol sinking process
Salvia Products
Panax
notoginseng
(MC)
Ethanol
Water
Note: EC denotes the consumptions of energy, and MC denotes the consumptions of various
materials.
Fig. 3. The system boundary of carbon flow analysis for the CSDP production process.
3.2. Carbon flow analysis of the whole production
In order to quantitatively evaluate the utilization efficiency of
carbon in the case enterprise, this paper took the CSDP production
process as the research object, and the carbon SFA of the whole
process was calculated. According to the law of conservation of
mass, the balance framework is as follows:
MEC þ MMC ¼ MP þ MSR þ MLE þ MGE
Where, MEC, MMC, MP, MSR, MLE and MGE are the quantity of fossil
fuels, raw materials, products, solid waste, liquid waste and flue
gas, measured in tons.
Based on Equation (1), the carbon balance equation can be
calculated as follows:
CEC þ CMC ¼ CP þ CSR þ CLE þ CGE
Where, CEC, CMC, CP, CSR, CLE and CGE are respectively the quantity of
carbon input from fossil fuel consumption, the quantity of carbon
contained in raw materials, products, solid waste, liquid waste and
flue gas in tons. The carbon from fossil fuel consumption is calcu-
lated by converting it into feed coal, and the amount of CO2
generated in the processes of thermal power generation and steam
production is also contained in the calculation of CO2 emissions.
The difference between the carbon input and carbon emission in
these two processes is ignored because these are outside of the
system boundary considered in this research.
Equation (2) can be changed to:
CW ¼ CSR þ CLE þ CGE ¼ ðCEC þ CMC Þ
CP
Where, CW denotes the sum of the carbon contained in the solid,
liquid and gas waste generated in the production process.
3.3. Accounting method and processing for carbon contents
The method for converting the quantity of raw materials, en-
ergy, products and wastes into the quantity of carbon is: the
quantity of raw materials, energy, products and wastes multiplied
by their carbon-containing fractions, calculated as:
Ci ¼ Mi  Wi
Where, Ci, Mi and Wi respectively denote the carbon contents,
quantity and carbon-containing percentage related to various
X. Meng et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 163 (2017) 49e57
Outputs inputs and outputs, measured in tons and percent. For non-
carbonaceous raw materials, energy, products and waste, the car-
bon contents are recorded as zero. For example, the carbon content
of water and steam are both zero.
Flue gas 3.3.1. Carbon from fossil fuels
The main carbon input for fossil fuel is carbon from electricity
Liquid waste
and steam input. The method used to calculate carbon from fossil
fuels is based on IPCC 2006 (IPCC, 2006). It is assumed that the
carbon from electricity is equal to carbon (C) emissions in the
Solid residue thermal power generation process using feed coal. Steam is pro-
duced by a coal-fired boiler, therefore, the carbon from steam is
equal to the carbon (C) emission in the steam production using feed
coal.
The formula for converting fossil fuels to carbon is:
CEC ¼ MCoal  WCoal
¼ ðMEle
Coal þ MSte
Coal Þ  EFCoal  CVCoal  12=44 (5)
MEle
Coal ¼ QEle  K (6)
QSte  CVSte
MSte
Coal ¼ (7)
CVCoal  h
Where MEle-Coal is the quantity of feed coal for electricity generation,
with the unit t, which is equal to the product of QEle and K; QEle is the
(1) quantity of electricity consumed, with the unit kWh; K represents
the conversion coefficient from electricity to feed coal, which is
0.286 kg/kWh. MSte-Coal is the quantity of feed coal for steam pro-
duction, with the unit t; QEle is the quantity of steam input, with the
unit t; h is thermal efficiency of the boilers, measured in percent.
CVCoal and CVSte represent the calorific value of feed coal and steam
in China which are 6800 and 585 kcal/kg. EFCoal is the CO2 emission
factor of feed coal in IPCC 2006, which is 3.96  10
4 kg CO2/kcal.
(2) The 12 and 44 in the formula are the atomic weight of Carbon and
the molecular weight of CO2. The data on K, CVCoal and CVSte were
obtained from the Handbook of Energy Statistics, published by the
Chinese National Energy Administration.
3.3.2. Carbon in ethanol
Ethanol's formula is C2H5OH, its molecular weight is 46, the
concentration of ethanol used in the production is 95%, so
WEthanol ¼ 24/46  95% z 49.56%.
3.3.3. Carbon as COD from wastewater
The production wastewater and domestic wastewater are dis-
charged into the company's wastewater treatment station, which
(3) are then treated in accordance with the secondary standard of
GB8978-1996 Integrated Wastewater Discharge Standard. It is
assumed that it ignores the contribution of other component to
COD reduction, which is that there are no other reducing sub-
stances like sulfide ion. In addition, it is assumed that the reduction
of COD at the inlet and outlet of the wastewater treatment plants is
all converted to CO2. Under these assumptions, 1 mol C corresponds
with 1 mol O2, the atomic weights of C and O are 12 and 16, so 1 g C
corresponds to 2.67 g COD (Chen et al., 2009). The quantity of
carbon as CO2 in this process is denoted as CCOD
CO2 . The carbon
contained in the remaining COD of the outlet is discharged into the
environment in the form of COD, denoted as CCOD.
(4) CCOD
CO2 ¼ P  ðCoin dCoout Þ÷2:67 (8)
CCOD ¼ P  Coout ÷2:67 (9)
 X. Meng et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 163 (2017) 49e57
In Equations (8) and (9), P is the quantity of wastewater generated
in the production process. Coout denotes the concentration of COD at
the outlet; Coin denotes the concentration of COD at the inlet.
3.4. Data collection and processing
3.4.1. Elemental analysis
The medicinal herbs (salvia or panax notoginseng) extract and
herb residue investigated in this study were obtained from the
pharmaceutical enterprise. After being dried in an oven at 80  C,
these samples were ground using a high-speed rotary cutting mill
and screened to obtain a particle size of 0.15e0.85 mm. Then,
elemental analysis of these samples was performed using a Flash
EA1112 elemental analyzer (Thermo Electron). The carbon-
containing fractions (Wi) of various materials were obtained
through this elemental analysis. The test results are displayed in
Table 2. The carbon elemental composition of medicinal herbs,
extract and herb residue are 43.29 wt.%, 53.35 wt.% and 43.31 wt.%
respectively.
3.4.2. Environmental benefit analysis of CP technologies
After the implementation of CP technologies, a large amount of
material/energy was saved. Based on the investigation of the main
low fossil-carbon transformation projects, the related environ-
mental benefit is quantified in Table 3. To calculate total fossil fuels
saved, the quantity of electricity and feed coal is converted into
standard coal equivalent according to their heating value, which is
measured in tce (ton of standard coal equivalent). 1 tce is equal to
7000 kcal. In total, more than 190 tce of fossil energy and 92 tons of
ethanol were saved. CO2 emissions and herb residue were reduced
by 350 tons and 193 tons respectively.
3.4.3. Basic input/output data collection
A field investigation was conducted to obtain the quantity of
various inputs (salvia or panax notoginseng, energy sources),
products (CSDP) and outputs (herb residue and wastewater) in the
CSDP production process in 2013 (see Table 4).
3.5. Low-carbon evaluation indicators
In order to more clearly understand the flow of carbon in
different parts and assess the low-carbon benefits of CP technology
integration scenario, this study introduced four indicators: RC-P,
RC
CO2 , RC-SR and RC-COD. The descriptions and calculation formulas
of these indicators are shown in Table 5.
4. Results and discussion
4.1. Carbon flow analysis under two scenarios
The most important aspect of this paper is the carbon content
calculation of each part. The calculation was carried out based on
Section 3.4, and divided into two scenarios. The first scenario
Table 2
The composition of medicinal herbs, CSDP and herb residue determined by
elemental analysis.
Sample Item
Elemental analysis (wt. %)
[C] [H] [N] [O]a
Medicinal herbs 43.29 5.52 2.10 49.09
CSDP 53.35 8.23 0 38.42
Herb residue 43.31 5.84 1.78 44.15
a
Calculated by difference.
53
considered the input, stock and output of carbon before the
implementation of CP technologies. It is called this “BAU Scenario”
(S0). The second scenario considered the production process after
implementing CP technologies in Table 1. It is called this the “CP
Scenario” (S1).
Based on the data collected in Section 3.3, the calculation pro-
cess is shown in Table 6. In addition, Fig. 4 shows further analysis of
the carbon flow in the production process, and presents a com-
parison of the two scenarios.
From the carbon flow charts, we can see that the CP technologies
changed the carbon flow. Fig. 4 compares the carbon flow under S0
and S1. The primary changes were: carbon from electricity, carbon
from steam, carbon as CO2, carbon in herb residue and carbon in
ethanol. Under S1 these were reduced by 53.63%, 24.21%, 46.01%,
75.93% and 55.55% respectively. The carbon in medical herbs put
into the production process and the carbon stored in the product
were the same in S0 and S1. The carbon utilization efficiency was
improved by the implementation of CP technology integration.
Therefore, to implement low-carbon development in the herbal
medical industry, technologies that reduce fossil fuel consumption
and herb residue discharge should be selected.
4.2. Low-carbon assessment results using indicators under two
scenarios
According to the calculation method in Section 3.4 and 3.5, the
final low-carbon assessment results of different parts and in-
dicators can be obtained (see Table 7, Fig. 5).
The results show that: after the implementation of CP technol-
ogies e when producing the same amount of product e the amount
of total carbon put into the production system is 406.91 tons, which
is 39.24% lower than S0. The amount of resources conserved is
remarkable.
Fig. 5 is a comparison of low-carbon evaluation indicators be-
tween the two scenarios. After implementing CP technologies, the
percentage of carbon stored in the product (RC-P) was 4.23%, which
is 1.65 times higher than S0. This means that carbon utilization
efficiency increased by 65.00%. In addition, the percentage of car-
bon as CO2 emitted into the atmosphere (RC
CO2 ) was 62.70%,
which is 11.14% lower than S0. The percentage of carbon in solid
waste (RC-SW) increased by 23.05%, because the total amount of
carbon put into the system as the denominator decreased. How-
ever, the absolute amount of carbon in solid waste was reduced by
45.35 tons. The percentage of carbon in herb residue (RC-HR) was
reduced by 60.40%. This shows that the CP Scenario was effective in
the reduction and reuse of the herb residue.
4.3. Low-carbon orientated development of the herbal medicine
industry by integrating CP technologies
Cleaner production is a strategy for achieving sustainable pro-
duction, saving resources and energy, as well as reducing waste and
emissions at the source, which is distinct from end-of-pipe tech-
nologies (Basappaji and Nagesha, 2014; Hong and Li, 2013).
Implementing CP has also become an effective strategy to promote
industrial low carbon development.
Based on the results above, the implementation of CP technol-
ogy integration can bring significant environmental and economic
benefits for enterprises. It can also effectively promote enterprise's
energy conservation and low fossil-carbon development. Ethanol
recovery technology can only reduce ethanol consumption, and
cannot reduce CO2 emissions. However, Ethanol recovery technol-
ogy reduced the percentage of carbon as raw carbon put into the
production system which caused RC-P to increase. Therefore, it can
54 X. Meng et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 163 (2017) 49e57

Table 3
Main environmental benefits of the CP technology integration.

No. Technology Main environmental benefits

1 HRPUa Reduced herb residue discharge by 193.62 ton/a, saved 63.62 tce/a of fossil energy, reduced CO2 emissions by 158.42 ton/a.
2 KEAC Reduced electricity consumption by 53.98 tce/a, and reduced CO2 emission by 134.41 ton/a.
3 ER The recovery percentage of ethanol can be increased by 10%, and its recycling percentage can be increased to 90%, 92.55 tons
of alcohol can be saved annually.
4 CWWR Reduced wastewater discharge 3000 ton/a.
5 SCWR Saved 24% of boiler fuel, which is 37.89 tce/a.
6 Total Saved fossil energy consumption by 155.49 tce/a, reduced CO2 emissions by 292.83 ton/a, 92.55 t/a of ethanol, reduced herb residue
discharge by 193.62 ton/a, and wastewater discharge by 3000 ton/a.
a
Note concerning the benefit calculation for HRPU technology. The results in Section 2.2 show that the highest oil yield was 34.26% with a heating value of 24.91 MJ/kg. The
environmental benefit of this technology is quantified, and details are shown in Annex A. In addition, the environmental benefits of other technologies in Table 3 are quantified
by referring to their feasibility study reports in the enterprise.

Table 4
Basic input/output data in the CSDP production process in 2013.

Itema Before CP After CP

Input 1 Electricity 1784,057 kWh 827,182 kWh

2 Steamb 1498 t 1498 t
3 Salvia 227 t 227 t
4 Panaxnotoginseng 45 t 45 t
5 Fresh water 20,484 t 20,484 t
3 Ethanol 166.58 t 74.03 t
Stock 4 CSDP 32.28 t 32.28 t
Output 5 Herb residue 255.00 t 61.38 t
6 CO2 1732.88 t 935.55 t
7 Wastewaterc 19,688 t 16,688 t
a
CP refers to Cleaner Productions, then “Before CP” means the CSDP production process before the implementation of cleaner production technologies in Table 1.
b
The quantity of steam input after the implementing of SCWR technology is the same with that before, but the feed coal consumed is reduced. The boilers' model is 50 t/h
(DZL35) and their thermal efficiency h is 80% in this research.
c
The production wastewater is discharged into the company's wastewater treatment station. According to the monitoring report of the enterprise sewage treatment plant
under investigation, the average concentration of COD at the outlet (Coin) is 5.26  10
4 kg/L, and the average concentration of COD at the inlet (Coout) is 5.1  10
5 kg/L. The
percentage of COD reduced (RCOD) is 90.3%.

Table 5
Low-carbon evaluation indicators.

No. Indicator Description Calculation formula

1 RC-P Percentage of carbon stored in the product CP

CEC þCMC  100%
2 RC
CO2 Percentage of carbon emitted as CO2 into the atmosphere CEC þCCOD
CO2
CEC þCMC  100%
3 RC-COD Percentage of carbon in COD CCOD
CEC þCMC  100%
4 RC-SW Percentage of carbon in solid waste 1
RC
P
RC
CO2
RC
COD

Note: RC-P shows the carbon utilization efficiency of the system. The higher the RC-P, the higher a firm's carbon utilization efficiency. RC
CO2 , RC-COD and RC-SW can show the
environmental impact of the system, the lower indicators the better situation.

be concluded that saving raw materials can also reduce carbon recycling. This can be achieved by substituting biomass energy for
emissions from the perspective of the whole life cycle. electricity, saving technical reconstruction, and reuse of industrial
The low-carbon development for herbal medicine industry wastes, particularly herb residue. Based on these criteria, we
should focus on reducing fossil fuel consumption and waste designed a low-carbon development framework based on CP
technological transformation for the herbal medicine industry, see
Fig. 6.
Table 6 According to statistics, the herbal medicine industry in China
Carbon content calculation of main input, stock and output under the two scenarios. produced about 1.5 million tons of herb residues annually (Wang
Item Mi (tons) Wi (%) Ci (tons) et al., 2010). If all the enterprises of Chinese herbal medicine in-
dustry implement the CP technology recommended in this
S0 S1 S0 S1
research, it will save 914,622 tce of fossil fuels, reduce herb residue
Input 1 Electricity 478.13 221.68 73.44 351.14 162.80
discharge by 1.14 million tons and reduce CO2 emissions by 1.72
2 Steam 161.09 122.09 73.44 118.30 89.66
3 Medical herbs 272.0 272.0 43.29 117.75 117.75 million tons per year. At the same time, the carbon utilization ef-
4 Ethanol 166.58 74.03 49.57 82.57 36.70 ficiency of the whole herbal medicine industry will increase by 65%.
Stock 4 CSDP 32.28 32.28 53.35 17.22 17.22
Output 5 Herb residue 255.0 61.38 43.31 110.44 26.58
5. Conclusion
6 CO2 1732.88 935.55 27.27 472.60 255.15
7 COD 1.00 0.85 37.45 0.37 0.32
8 Othersa / / / 69.13 107.64 In this paper, the cleaner production integration, including herb
Note: Ci, Mi and Wi denote the carbon contents, weights and carbon-containing
residue pyrolysis and utilization, ethanol recovery, key equipment
fractions of various inputs and outputs. automatic control, etc., are introduced to achieve the low-carbon
a
Calculated by difference. transformation for Chinese herbal medicine industry. Then, this
 X. Meng et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 163 (2017) 49e57 55

Fig. 4. Carbon flow chart of the production process under two scenarios.

research developed carbon flow analysis (CFA) combined with four
special indicators (RC-P, RC
CO2 , RC-SW and RC-COD) as a new quanti-
tative method to evaluate the effectiveness of low-carbon CP
technology integration for the industry. The results showed that the
amount of total carbon put into the production system after
implementing CP technologies was 39.25% lower than before when
producing the same amount of CSDP, and the percentage of carbon
as CO2 emitted into the atmosphere (RC
CO2 ) was also 11.14% lower
than before. This low-carbon orientated development model by
integrating CP technologies could bring remarkable benefits on
fossil fuel saving and emission reduction for Chinese herbal med-
icine industry.
For most enterprises implementing carbon flow analysis is easy,
because of its similarity to material balance accounting, and the
indicators developed in our research are easily calculated. Carbon
utilization efficiency (RC-P) is a suitable indicator for low-carbon
assessment of enterprises that use biomass as the main raw
material, because this index can directly display the carbon utili-
zation efficiency of the system. The indicators of RC
CO2 , RC-SW and
RC-COD are also useful for the evaluation of carbon emissions. These
can effectively reflect the level of low-carbon development. This
research provides an effective tool which is easy to operate and can
reflect both the resource utilization efficiency and carbon emissions
for industries that produce large amounts of biomass waste. It is
useful for the governments to assess and compare the low-carbon
benefits of these industries.
Pyrolysis liquefaction technology can convert the industrial
biomass waste to bio-oil, then, the bio-oil can be used in the pro-
duction process to replace fossil fuel. Biofuel production is a new
economic opportunity to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions

Table 7
Results of carbon flow analysis in different parts.

Item Ci (tons) Ri (%)

S0 S1 S0 S1

Total inputs 669.76 406.91 100 100

Production 17.22 17.22 2.57 4.23
CO2 472.60 255.15 70.56 62.70
COD 0.37 0.32 0.06 0.08
Solid waste Total solid waste 179.57 134.22 26.81 32.99
Herb residue 110.44 26.58 16.49 6.53
Others 69.13 107.64 10.32 26.46
Fig. 5. Low-carbon evaluation indicators under the two scenarios.
56 X. Meng et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 163 (2017) 49e57

Inputs Energy saving and Outputs LHV e Low Calorific Value of bio-oil, which is 2.4913  104 MJ/t
Ethanol emission reduction
recovery, etc.
Carbonaceous raw
as determined in a laboratory;
Products
material
Coe e Coefficient of converting into standard coal equivalent,
Cleaner production

production process
Recycled after

Herbal medicine
Automatic

which is 3.41  10
5 tce/MJ as calculated by the calorific value

technologies

control, etc. Waste water wastewater

High-carbon energy
(electricity, coal, etc.) treatment, etc.

Flue gas
Plant carbon conversion of standards coal;
fixation, etc.
Renewable energy
(biomass, etc.)
C e Specific heat capacity of herb residue, which is 1.7 MJ/t K;
Solid residue

Technological
transformation
biomass pyrolysis
for producing
liquid fuel, etc.
Existing process
Fig. 6. A low-carbon development framework for herbal medicine industry.
and improve sustainable energy production. Moreover, the possi-
bility of bioenergy production from agro-industrial lignocellulosic
biomass may reduce the dependency on fossil fuels, and it can also
reduce and utilize biological residue carbon resources. These all
promote industrial low-carbon development and have a positive
impact on the economy, environment, and society. It is an envi-
ronmentally friendly technology for the herbal medicine industry
and other similar industries that produce large amounts of biomass
wastes. This study provided one possible low-carbon trans-
formation strategy for industries that produce large amounts of
biomass waste and consume large amounts of fossil fuels.
Acknowledgment
The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support from
the National Natural Science Fund for Outstanding Young Scholars
of China (71522011), Commonwealth Program on Environmental
Protection (200809062, 01209039) of Ministry of Environmental
Protection of China. The contents of this paper reflect the views of
the authors and do not necessarily indicate acceptance by the
sponsors.
Annex A. Calculation process for the environmental benefit
of HRPU
The methods for calculating the environmental benefit of HRPU
are shown as following:
ESave, ESub, EPyr denotes the amount of fossil energy saved by the
herb residue pyrolysis project, replaced by bio-oil, and consumed in
the process of herb residue pyrolysis, respectively. They are all
converted into standard coal equivalent. MRe
CO2 denotes the
reduction of CO2 emission by the herb residue pyrolysis project.
Mre-hb denotes the reduction of herb residue discharge into the
environment.
ESave ¼ ESub
EPyr
Esub ¼ MHR  w  LHV  Coe
1 Mao, J., Lu, Z., Yang, Z., 2006. Eco-efficiency of lead in China's lead-acid battery
EPyr ¼ C  MHR  DT  Coe 
h
MRe
CO2 ¼ ESave  EFst
cool
Mre
hb ¼ MHR  ð1
εÞ
MHR e Weight of herb residue, which is 255 t;
w e Yield of bio-oil, which is 34.26% as determined in a
laboratory;
DT e Temperature difference between before and after pyroly-
sis, which is 430 K as determined by pyrolysis experiments;
h e Thermal efficiency of the pyrolysis furnace, which is 60%;
EFst-coal e CO2 emission factor of standards coal, which is 2.49;
Added process ε e The remaining residue after pyrolysis as a percentage of the
original herb residue, which is 24.07%.
In total, 63.62 tce of fossil fuels is saved, and 158.42 tons of CO2
and 193.62 tons of herb residues are reduced.
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