Multi-system urban waste-energy self-circulation: Design of urban self-circulation system based on emergy analysis

Abstract

The current worldwide state of energy scarcity and low waste utilization has led to a decrease in the supply of ecological services, something that seriously affects the development of cities. In this study, we propose an urban self-circulation design based on multiple systems within the traditional biogas, wetland, rainwater, solar power, and urban farm systems framework to achieve effective improvements in urban waste utilization and the optimization of the urban waste– energy flow cycle. Emergy conversion is used to evaluate system optimization, and the simulation results show that the novel proposed system can effectively improve urban waste utilization with an energy output rate of 3.18 × 10, an environmental load of 4.27 × 10−2, and a sustainability index of 7.45 × 102 in the core system; additionally, it can improve resource utilization of small-scale cities with an energy output rate of 1.85 × 100, an environmental load of 1.20 × 100, and a sustainability index of 1.54 × 100 in the total system. The inter-system energy flow model can significantly optimize urban energy systems based on ecological models with low-emergy resource input, including biogas systems and urban farm systems. This model can reduce the environmental load and effectively compensate for the reduced supply capacity of ecosystem services caused by urbanization, making it suitable for extension to other small-scale built environments that are relatively independent and rich in natural resources.