Designing Bioenergy Supply Chains Under Social Constraints

The use of renewable energy, as a clean alternative to fossil fuel, has become very attractive. It has environmental advantages and leads to regional development. This study proposes an optimization model for the design of bioenergy supply chains under social concerns. The social concerns involve the unemployment rate and the vulnerability to changes during an economic crisis. The areas that are mostly exposed to these social issues are chosen as initial potential locations for installing the biorefineries. Installing a biorefinery can generate jobs for the people of these areas. This leads to the sustainable development in the areas. The applicability of the developed model is shown through a case study. The results demonstrate that the proposed approach leads to the generation of a large number of job positions which has an important impact on the social development of these regions.