Sustainable Design of Energy Systems by Integrating Life Cycle Optimization With Superstructure Optimization

Abstract This paper provides an overview of sustainable design and synthesis of energy systems based on the superstructure optimization framework and life cycle optimization (LCO) principles. Basic steps, recent progress and research challenges on combining superstructure optimization with LCO for sustainable design of energy systems are presented. A number of research challenges and future research directions, such as automatic superstructure generation, broadening the scope of sustainable design with a consequential perspective, handling uncertainties and resilience using multi-stage data-driven robust optimization techniques, and integrating standalone energy systems through multi-scale nested superstructure optimization, are further discussed.