Energy Consumption: One Criterion for the Sustainable Design of Process Chains

Rising energy costs lead to rising product costs and cause companies to search for methods to reduce energy consumption in production process chains. Therefore, sustainability becomes a matter of competitiveness. Energy consumption in production is determined by the design of parts and the manufacturing process chains. If companies manage to assess and optimize the energy consumption of manufacturing process chains during the design phase, they will be able to reduce energy consumption and to take important competitive advantages. For the decision–making process, it is crucial to know at what point in the planning phase a decision about alternatives in production process chains can be taken. This paper presents an approach to take into account the energy consumption in the early stage of process chain design.