Prospectus

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Material Flow Analysis II

Course
2024-2025

Admission requirements

This course is an elective module for the joint degree MSc Programme on Industrial Ecology.
Students should have completed the course Material Flow Analysis I (MFA I).

Description

This course concentrates on advanced understanding and usage of material flow analysis (MFA) in various settings, with a focus on how material flows and stocks change over time. Students that take MFA I are highly encouraged to continue to this course, as together they provide a comprehensive up-to-date knowledge of the topic.

Building upon and expanding the concepts and contents of the course MFA I, in this course we into the practical and theoretical details of MFA as a headlining tool for sustainability in the domains of resource and waste management, circular economy, decoupling, material efficiency, services provisioning, critical materials, and material stock accounting, among others.

The main focus in this course is dynamic MFA, which is increasingly used for estimating and analyzing time series of past flows and stocks; future material demand & supply, stock accumulation, outflows and recycling / urban mining potentials; understanding time dependencies and lock in effects; quantifying service provision; emissions and other impacts over time; and other temporal dynamics of material flows and stocks at multiple scales.

Course objectives

In MFA II, students will gain a comprehensive understanding and ability to employ dynamic MFA, including:

  • To design advanced MFA research questions and apply dynamic MFA to answer them in case studies.

  • To model stock-driven and flow-driven dynamic MFA models, hybrid models, and their applications in Python.

  • To interpret, describe, and communicate MFA results using indicators, visualizations, etc. to stakeholders and decision makers.

  • To assess, interpret, and critically evaluate contemporary research that uses material flow analysis.

  • To Become familiar with current developments, case studies, and frontiers of dynamic MFA modelling.

Timetable

In MyTimetable, you can find all course and programme schedules, allowing you to create your personal timetable. Activities for which you have enrolled via MyStudyMap will automatically appear in your timetable.

Additionally, you can easily link MyTimetable to a calendar app on your phone, and schedule changes will be automatically updated in your calendar. You can also choose to receive email notifications about schedule changes. You can enable notifications in Settings after logging in.

Questions? Watch the video, read the instructions, or contact the ISSC helpdesk.

Note: Joint Degree students from Leiden/Delft need to combine information from both the Leiden and Delft MyTimetables to see a complete schedule. This video explains how to do it.

Mode of instruction

Weekly meetings involving lectures, roundtable discussions, in-class practice sessions, and workshops. Weekly self-study through individual and group assignments using real case studies and simulated scenarios.

Assessment method

  • Individual dynamic MFA project (80% of the final grade), including a poster presentation and python code. To be submitted at the end of the course. Submissions will be checked for originality.

  • Weekly assignments and exercises (together 20% of the final grade). These assignments can be individual, in pairs or small groups. In general, grading of these assignments will consist of submitted fully/partially/not submitted.

Retake
A retake of the MFA project is possible, with a maximum grade of 6.0.

Reading list

Recent publications from the MFA literature, centered around state-of-the-art peer-reviewed articles of case studies, reviews, and methodological advancements.

Registration

As a student, you are responsible for enrolling on time through MyStudyMap.

In this short video, you can see step-by-step how to enrol for courses in MyStudyMap.
Extensive information about the operation of MyStudyMap can be found here.

There are two enrolment periods per year:

  • Enrolment for the fall opens in July

  • Enrolment for the spring opens in December

See this page for more information about deadlines and enrolling for courses and exams.

Note:

  • It is mandatory to enrol for all activities of a course that you are going to follow.

  • Your enrolment is only complete when you submit your course planning in the ‘Ready for enrolment’ tab by clicking ‘Send’.

  • Not being enrolled for an exam/resit means that you are not allowed to participate in the exam/resit.

Contact

Coordinator: Dr. Tomer Fishman
Other involved teachers: Janneke van Oorschot and Sebastiaan Deetman

Remarks

This course is open for students of the MSc Industrial Ecology (joint degree TU Delft and Leiden University). Students can register for the course and exam via uSis.

Software
Starting from the 2024/2025 academic year, the Faculty of Science will use the software distribution platform Academic Software. Through this platform, you can access the software needed for specific courses in your studies. For some software, your laptop must meet certain system requirements, which will be specified with the software. It is important to install the software before the start of the course. More information about the laptop requirements can be found on the student website.