Life-cycle assessment of SO2 removal from flue gas using carbonate melt

Abstract

To determine the environmentally-benign process between the carbonate melt flue gas desulfurization (CMFGD) and the conventional process as the process of removing SO2 from the flue gas, in this paper, a life cycle assessment is applied using the data derived from the process simulation, including the heat integration methodology. The CMFGD process has a 14.4%–26.8% lower environmental impact than the conventional process on all indicators. To achieve the economic and environmental benefits of the CMFGD process, a heat exchanger network (HEN) is introduced using HI to use the heat wasted in the CMFGD process. The HEN reduces environmental impacts (i.e., reduced CC by 24.46%, and PM by 49.96%), and economics (reduced total levelized cost by 0.8%) compared to the CMFGD process before HI. These results suggest that the CMFGD process can replace the conventional methods to remove SO2 from the flue gas and can have environmental benefits by reducing CC and PM, significantly influencing the atmosphere.