SCALEM© - Software for CALculating EMergy based on life cycle inventories

Context

SCALEM© allows the calculation of eMergy flows in complex real systems like the entire technosphere described by the commonly used Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) databases. Most importantly, it makes this possible in an automatic way that complies with the rules of eMergy algebra.

Overview

In SCALEM© the whole network representing the studied system is explored as a graph (where each process represents a node of the system and the nodes are interconnected through the energy and mass flows they exchange). The different nodes are visited following the depth-first search strategy. The software is programmed in C++.

Benefits

The software SCALEM©:

• allows the calculation of eMergy of any good or service produced and delivered by large technology (industrial production) systems
• extends therefore the possibility to calculate eMergy to commercial goods, while it was so far limited to trophic networks
• has a graphical user interface and does not require user intervention for graphical representation of the system’s network
• performs fast eMergy calculations even for networks comprising several thousands of nodes
• respects the eMergy algebra rules

Potential applications

SCALEM© can be applied in the eMergy evaluation of any good or service whose production system is represented by a life cycle model.