Techno-economic and environmental implications of decarbonization process applied for Romanian fossil-based power generation sector

Abstract

This study estimates the technical, economic and environmental impact of decarbonization strategy on Romanian fossil power generation sector. Two post-combustion decarbonization options are considered either for existing power plant retrofit or new investment based on current conventional designs: a technological and commercial mature chemical scrubbing process using methyl-diethanol-amine (MDEA) and one more innovative and energy-efficient gas-solid process using calcium looping (CaL). Considering the Romanian power generation sector conditions, natural gas, hard coal and lignite were assessed as fuels. The decarbonized designs have 1000 MW net electricity output to permit an easier scale-up calculation with 90% CO2 capture rate. The non-decarbonized designs are also assessed to quantify the decarbonization energy and economic costs. It was shown that the decarbonization of Romanian fossil-fired electricity plants has significant benefits in term of increasing overall energy efficiency (from current 30–33% for coal and lignite and 35–39% for natural gas to 32.5–36% and 48–52% respectively) as well as reducing the cost of electricity (from current 80–120 €/MWh to 55–85 €/MWh). The investment effort to replace all fossil fleet (both gas and coal) with new modern units is foreseen to be substantial (about 11.2–14.9 billion Euro). A detailed environmental analysis was provided to assess the overall impact of decarbonization.