An ontological approach towards enabling processing technologies participation in industrial symbiosis

•A new approach enabling processing technologies participation in Industrial Symbiosis.•Introduction of technology classification, characterization and semantic description.•The approach is implemented as a web service.•Demonstration of performance is achieved using real-life companies as case study.

A new ontological framework which supports processing technologies participation in Industrial Symbiosis (IS) is proposed. The framework uses semantic web service formalism to describe technology based on tacit knowledge embedded in the domain ontology and explicit knowledge acquired from the users. To enhance technology discovery, IS relevant processing technology classification and characterization is proposed. Technology participation in IS is addressed. Partial semantic input–output matching is used to propose complex and innovative networks assessed and ranked by their technological, economic and environmental benefits. The proposed framework is implemented as a web service and operation demonstrated using a case study.