Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban

Climate change will increase the frequency and severity of supply-chain disruptions and large-scale economic crises, also prompting environmentally-protective local policies. Here we use econometric time series analysis, inventory-driven price formation, dynamic material flow analysis, and gate-to-g...

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Main Authors: Ryter, John, Fu, Xinkai, Bhuwalka, Karan, Roth, Richard, Olivetti, Elsa A.
Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Materials Systems Laboratory
Format: Article
Published: Research Square 2021
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/131052
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author Ryter, John
Fu, Xinkai
Bhuwalka, Karan
Roth, Richard
Olivetti, Elsa A.
author2 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Materials Systems Laboratory
author_facet Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Materials Systems Laboratory
Ryter, John
Fu, Xinkai
Bhuwalka, Karan
Roth, Richard
Olivetti, Elsa A.
author_sort Ryter, John
collection MIT
description Climate change will increase the frequency and severity of supply-chain disruptions and large-scale economic crises, also prompting environmentally-protective local policies. Here we use econometric time series analysis, inventory-driven price formation, dynamic material flow analysis, and gate-to-gate life cycle analysis to model the response of each copper supply chain actor to China’s solid waste import ban and the COVID-19 pandemic. We demonstrate that the economic changes associated with China’s solid waste import ban increase primary refining within China, offsetting the environmental benefits of decreased copper scrap refining and generating a cumulative increase in CO2e emissions of up to 35 Mt by 2040. Increasing China’s refined copper imports reverses this trend, decreasing CO2e emissions both in China (up to 300 Mt by 2040) and globally (up to 63 Mt). We test model outcome sensitivity to supply chain disruptions and economic crises using GDP, mining, and refining shocks associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, showing the results maintain impact magnitude alongside disruption effects.
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spelling mit-1721.1/1310522022-09-27T09:37:36Z Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban Ryter, John Fu, Xinkai Bhuwalka, Karan Roth, Richard Olivetti, Elsa A. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Materials Systems Laboratory MIT Materials Research Laboratory Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Materials Science and Engineering Climate change will increase the frequency and severity of supply-chain disruptions and large-scale economic crises, also prompting environmentally-protective local policies. Here we use econometric time series analysis, inventory-driven price formation, dynamic material flow analysis, and gate-to-gate life cycle analysis to model the response of each copper supply chain actor to China’s solid waste import ban and the COVID-19 pandemic. We demonstrate that the economic changes associated with China’s solid waste import ban increase primary refining within China, offsetting the environmental benefits of decreased copper scrap refining and generating a cumulative increase in CO2e emissions of up to 35 Mt by 2040. Increasing China’s refined copper imports reverses this trend, decreasing CO2e emissions both in China (up to 300 Mt by 2040) and globally (up to 63 Mt). We test model outcome sensitivity to supply chain disruptions and economic crises using GDP, mining, and refining shocks associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, showing the results maintain impact magnitude alongside disruption effects. 2021-06-25T14:35:12Z 2021-06-25T14:35:12Z 2020-11 Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/131052 Ryter, John et al. "Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban." Under review in Nature Portfolio (2021): dx.doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-86991/v1. © 2021 The Author(s) http://dx.doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-86991/v1 Nature Portfolio Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ application/pdf Research Square Nature
spellingShingle Ryter, John
Fu, Xinkai
Bhuwalka, Karan
Roth, Richard
Olivetti, Elsa A.
Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban
title Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban
title_full Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban
title_fullStr Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban
title_full_unstemmed Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban
title_short Emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for COVID and China’s solid waste import ban
title_sort emission impacts of supply chain disruptions for covid and china s solid waste import ban
url https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/131052
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