Analysis of the Energetic- and Exergetic Sustainability of Complex Systems

Abstract

Abstract The paper presents the application of a general society/environment interaction model to a real modern industrial society: the Italian system. As described in [3], the energetic and exergetic flow diagrams of a complex system can be represented, from resource extraction to end use, in a highly aggregated and general fashion as fluxes of natural and fossil resources, of raw materials, of thermal-, chemical- and material “wastes”. The energy and exergy balances of the five sectors in which an industrial society can be divided are computed, as well as the material and energy internal exchanges which derive from resource extraction, trading, industrial, agricultural and domestic activities. The numerical data on which the model is tested have been taken from a specific study performed on the Italian system for the year 1990 [1,8]: since a large data-reduction activity is involved, no effort has been made to include more recent data. The results show that the model parameters are unequivocally related to the technological level of the society under examination, and to its “comfort level”, which can be measured by the amount of energy consumed pro-capite in the residential and tertiary sectors: therefore, the claim for generality raised in [12] is confirmed. The quantitative simulation of two alternative steady-state scenarios lead to the conclusion that self-sustainability (intended as societal survival sustained only by renewable resources) is a non realistic goal for Italy and presumably for any other modern industrial society, in that its achievement -though technically possible- would require such a derating of the life quality standards to be politically and socially unfeasible.