Abstract
Waste Heat Recovery (WHR) Systems are spreading more and more in cement factories and are essential in achieving the energy performance required by the European Directives, legislation, and standards. Using WHR Systems may assure an important percentage of the energy required by the manufacturing process, with no additional fuel and no additional greenhouse gas emissions. Using the waste heat as a power generation source, increases the energy efficiency of the process and decreases the thermal energy losses. As long as the kiln is functional, so is the WHR powerplant, generating the energy in an efficient manufacturing process with low operational costs and increased reliability. This paper aims at evaluating the actual technic and economic performance of a WHR System compared to the estimated performance determined in the feasibility study which was done prior to the investment in order to prove the viability of the technology in the cement manufacturing industrial sector. The paper proves that the WHR proved to be financially inefficient if the feasibility study input data was considered and correlated with the actual technical performance but lead to extremely attractive financial indicators when considering actual, updated capital expenditures and operational expenditures and technical performance.
Highlights
The cement industry has a significant environmental footprint due to the high amount of thermal energy required by the process, mainly coming from the burning of traditional fuels
The cement manufacturers focused their attention on ORC technology because it has proven its energy performance and it has reduced the high amount of greenhouse gas emissions generated by this industry
Without a sustainable strategy to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions, the quantity of CO2 could achieve over 36 Gt after 2022, as shown in the Figure 2 [3]. 50% of CO2 emissions are produced during the calcination process, in which the limestone is transformed into lime as an outcome of a chemical reaction [3]
Summary
The cement manufacturers focused their attention on ORC technology because it has proven its energy performance and it has reduced the high amount of greenhouse gas emissions generated by this industry. The cement industry has a significant environmental footprint due to the high amount of thermal energy required by the process, mainly coming from the burning of traditional fuels. Without a sustainable strategy to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions, the quantity of CO2 could achieve over 36 Gt after 2022, as shown in the Figure 2 [3]. About 40% of the total quantity of CO2 are produced as a result of the burning processes required to achieve the 1,450 ̊C temperature of clinkerization. The rest of 10% of the greenhouse gas emissions are the result of electricity needed to run the plant [3]. To reach the target proposed by the Green Deal, a carbon neutral Europe by 2050 and reduce the CO2 emissions in the cement sector with 30% by 2030, the industry has the opportunity to invest in kiln upgrades and waste heat recovery using ORC systems [4]
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