Technical and Economic Analysis of the Implementation of a Self-Sustainable Briquetting Process for Electric Generation

Rosa Martins,Frederico De Oliveira Assuncao,Levy Ely Lacerda Oliveira,Haylemar De Nazaret Cardenas-Rodriguez,Germano Lambert-Torres,Luiz Eduardo Borges-Da-Silva,Wilson Cesar Sant’Ana,Afonso Henriques Moreira Santos,Jamil Haddad,Clodoaldo Barboza Bomfin,Helcio Francisco Villa-Nova,Erik Leandro Bonaldi

doi:10.3390/en15062146

Rosa Martins, Frederico De Oliveira Assuncao + Show 10 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/en15062146

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Journal: Energies	Publication Date: Mar 15, 2022
Citations: 1	License type: CC BY 4.0

Affiliation: Federal University of Itajubá

Abstract

The wood industry is an essential part of the economy of some regions in Brazil. Although the excess of wood residue is an environmental concern, it is also an alternative source for electricity generation. This allows for compliance with current legislation to minimize environmental impacts such as strategies to control the emission of pollutants and the decarbonization in the wood exploration activity. Despite this, the thermoelectric plants based on wood residues face problems associated with the low efficiency in generation due to the high moisture content of the residues, and challenges related to transport and storage. In this sense, this work is to evaluate the application of a self-sustainable briquetting plant as an alternative for solving the problems associated with the high moisture content, transport, and storage of wood residues. The aspects related to the construction of the briquetting plant and economic indicators associated with the economic feasibility, such as, the estimation of the net present value over the project lifecycle, internal rate of return and pay-back period, are also presented and discussed. The results demonstrated the feasibility of the plant mainly due to the better energy/volume ratio of the briquette (drying and compaction) and the transportation cost savings associated to the density of the compacted material.

Highlights

It has been considered the study of the characterization of residual biomass as one of the main steps to investigate the energy potential of the region [19], considering the briquette production process as a better alternative for the use of the energy contained in the wood residues to producing bigger amounts of electric energy inside of a power plant
From the Higher Heating Value (HHV), the Lower Heating Value (LHV) can be calculated by the Equation (1), this equation considers the amount of hydrogen in the elemental composition of the wood sample [19]. 6% hydrogen content was considered
The discount rate was varied from 10–80% and the net present value (NPV) was calculated at the third year project and the results indicated that the Internal Rate of Return (IRR) is approximately 45–55% in both cases

Summary

Introduction

The use of wood biomass for energy production still has some limitations, mainly due to the physical properties of the wood itself [1]. The presence of moisture in the biomass causes a reduction in its heating value and an increase in transport costs and a decrease in burning performance [2]. Transportation tends to be a limiting economic factor when hauling woody biomass, as low bulk density results in high transportation costs [3]. Despite the great potential for use, forest residues are not yet fully utilized due to gathering and transport costs, which results in the smaller economic attractiveness of forest biomass for energy purposes [4]. Besides handling and storage limitations, according to Muniz [6], the use of wood residue in the generation of heat energy, without receiving prior processing or preparation, becomes inefficient due to moisture content, which can often harm the combustion capacity. Different studies recommend a moisture content between 5% and 12%, depending on the nature of biomass [8]

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