Energy-Saving and Detailed Techno-Economic Assessment of the CO2 Avoided Cost for Emerging Designs of a Solvent-Based CO2 Capture Facility

Proposed process intensification in the literature claims relevant savings in operational cost through optimization of the energy required to operate a typical solvent-based CO2 capture facility, meanwhile granting the same capture performance. However, the techno-economic assessment for these proposed designs is not well developed and not fairly compared using a detailed and standardized cost evaluation technique that follows the association for the advancement of cost engineering (ACEE) class 4 costing methodology. This limitation makes it difficult and less viable to decide which solution is more cost-effective in consideration of the integration market with coal or natural gas combined cycle power plants. This work suggests a standardized methodology for cost evaluation and ultimately aids in formulating an accurate and high-fidelity guideline for industrial deployment of the proposed technologies, covering analysis on the flue gas compression (FGC) and lean vapor compression (LVC) configurations. Design, simulation, sensitivity analysis, and optimization are conducted initially to build a baseline design that closely represents an existing commercial design, such as Cansolv and Petra Nova technologies. The energy saving from the two configurations is analyzed in parallel to the investment cost, levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), and the CO2 avoided cost. It was found that FGC improved the capture performance of the baseline design, but at the same time raised the cost of operation and investment by a higher magnitude, making the CO2 avoided cost $98.2/tonneCO2, which is $16 higher than that of the baseline design. Meanwhile, LVC has been defined as an attractive configuration for lowering the CO2 avoided cost.