• Energy Research

Alternative Food Networks (AFNs) are challenging the traditional food system by leveraging concepts such as self-organisation and self-management aiming to shorten the food supply chain and give cu...

The concept of Industry 4.0 has been mainly addressed by the current literature from a technological perspective, overlooking the organisational and even ethical challenges related to this recent paradigm. In order to become ‘4.0 compliant’, an enterprise must adapt its organisation and business approaches, and these changes may lead to a significant impact on sustainability. Therefore, we performed a systematic literature review to investigate the most recent Industry 4.0 research streams by adopting a multi-perspective approach. This analysis led to collect insights on the key traits of an Enterprise 4.0: integration, decomposed hierarchy, flexibility, and autonomy. Each of these keywords involves work environments, business and organisational models, and educational approaches, which constitute the key traits of the novel framework proposed in this study.

Abstract Within the paradigm of “Industry 4.0”, data collection and management acquire new relevance. In this context, the introduction of the Internet of Things (IoT) in the manufacturing field allows to develop information systems able to offer the possibility of using a large amount of data collected from heterogeneous sources in real time. The information thus obtained is functional not only to the attainment of an industrial development but also for evaluation and improvement of its sustainability. For example, the benefit obtainable for the life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology from the new digital configuration is represented by a greater specificity of data that wireless sensors networks (WSN) measure and transmit in a continuous way. This paper explores the benefit of using a sensor for the evaluation of the environmental impact, in particular for LCA, in an Italian company producing chemical formulations. The machinery electric consumption directly measured data is compared with the same data estimated with mathematical models. It highlights how much different approach of data measurement and calculation can affect the LCA results. The detection of the energy variable related to a single machine for a particular process, which has been described in the paper, represents a first step towards the implementation of a WSN, proposed by Scatol8 srl, to be used to produce in a more sustainable way.

The sustainability debate in the food sector has exposed the current food system to critics, encouraging the significant growth of Alternative Food Networks (AFNs), new ways of food production, distribution and consumption that aim to shorten the food chain. Our study is focused on Food Assembly (FA), a special kind of AFN combining the culture of social entrepreneurship and digital innovation to achieve sustainability and a high social impact. The coexistence of a digital platform and a weekly farmers’ market triggers, within this network, mechanisms of knowledge sharing and self-organisation. To date, however, few studies have focused simultaneously on online and on-site interactions within AFNs, especially with quantitative studies. Our paper aims to test the hypothesis that online and on-site knowledge sharing affects the success of a FA measured by customer sustainable behaviour change. To do so, we developed a quantitative analysis based on a regression model. We collected data via a questionnaire submitted to 8497 Italian FA customers, of which 2115 responses were included in our analysis. The results show that online knowledge sharing significantly affects customer change towards more sustainable purchasing and consumption behaviours, while on-site knowledge sharing positively affects sustainable purchasing behaviours.