Research Article
Life cycle assessment of remanufacturing technologies for industrial robots
@INPROCEEDINGS{10.4108/eai.24-2-2023.2330690, author={Yanshuang Jia and Mengyue Liu and Yue Yang and Xueliang Yuan and Qingsong Wang and Qiao Ma}, title={Life cycle assessment of remanufacturing technologies for industrial robots}, proceedings={Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Engineering Management and Information Science, EMIS 2023, February 24-26, 2023, Chengdu, China}, publisher={EAI}, proceedings_a={EMIS}, year={2023}, month={6}, keywords={life cycle assessment; environmental impact; remanufacturing products; industrial robots}, doi={10.4108/eai.24-2-2023.2330690} }- Yanshuang Jia
Mengyue Liu
Yue Yang
Xueliang Yuan
Qingsong Wang
Qiao Ma
Year: 2023
Life cycle assessment of remanufacturing technologies for industrial robots
EMIS
EAI
DOI: 10.4108/eai.24-2-2023.2330690
Abstract
With the acceleration of industrialization, the mount of consumption and scrapping of industrial robots has been increasing rapidly. In this study, the life cycle assessment method was applied to quantify the environmental impact of remanufacturing technologies for industrial robots in the system boundary of “gate to gate”, with 1 iSNM remanufactured industrial robot as the functional unit. The results showed that fine particulate matter formation, human non-carcinogenic toxicity and global warming were the key impact categories, causing 95% of environmental impacts. The repair process and rated load operation process were key processes that caused the greatest environmental impact. By the critical substance identification, copper and aluminum were considered as the key inputs to the environmental impact of the robot remanufacturing, contributing 42.5% and 37.6% of the total environmental impacts, respectively. This research provided reference for a more sustainable industrial robot remanufacturing technology.