An Integrated Approach to the Design of Centralized and Decentralized Biorefineries with Environmental, Safety, and Economic Objectives

Abstract

Biorefineries provide economic, environmental, and social benefits towards sustainable development. Because of the relatively small size of typical biorefineries compared to oil and gas processes, it is necessary to evaluate the options of decentralized (or distributed) plants that are constructed near the biomass resources and product markets versus centralized (or consolidated) facilities that collect biomass from different regions and distribute the products to the markets, benefiting from the economy of scale but suffering from the additional transportation costs. The problem is further compounded when, in addition to the economic factors, environmental and safety aspects are considered. This work presents an integrated approach to the design of biorefining facilities while considering the centralized and decentralized options and the economic, environmental, and safety objectives. A superstructure representation is constructed to embed the various options of interest. A mathematical programming formulation is developed to transform the problem into an optimization problem. A new correlation is developed to estimate the capital cost of biorefineries and to facilitate the inclusion of the economic functions in the optimization program without committing to the type of technology or the size of the plant. A new metric called Total Process Risk is also introduced to evaluate the relative risk of the process. Life cycle analysis is applied to evaluate environmental emissions. The environmental and safety objectives are used to establish tradeoffs with the economic objectives. A case study is solved to illustrate the value and applicability of the proposed approach.

Core Challenges and Prospects of Methanol Utilization, Prediction and Optimization for Sustainable Environment

“…This creates the necessity of infrastructure development in order to facilitate the users of methanol-fueled applications, i.e., SI engines. Currently, they may be finding it very difficult to reach the methanol refueling stations, especially in remote or less populated regions [59]. Thus, the solution in this case will be expansion of methanol refueling stations network which will promote the widespread utilization of methanol as a renewable alternative fuel in SI engines.…”

Design of an integrated biorefinery for bioethylene production from industrial forest byproducts

“…18 The optimization of the process lines of biorefineries encompassing technical, environmental, and economic aspects has been the subject of intense research in recent years. [19][20][21][22] These studies highlighted that more studies are needed to (i) reduce costs of enzymatic hydrolysis by improving the conversion process of lignocellulosic material to fermentable sugars, 23 (ii) optimize bioethanol production technology, 20 (iii) use of less purified bioethanol for cost and energy savings, 20 (iv) reduce the influence of impurities in bioethanol on the efficiency of the catalytic process of ethylene production, 20 (v) develop of catalysts for bioethanol conversion to ethylene at low temperature. 21 Ethylene production costs and yield widely vary depending on the lignocellulosic raw material selected and on the location of the plant.…”

Strategic Planning of an Integrated Fuel Production System with a Fair-Sustainable Approach

“…Florez and Maravelias developed a superstructure approach to optimize biofuel substitution of fossil fuels. Decentralized and distributed biorefining has also been proposed for reducing the life-cycle carbon footprint of biofuel systems − while considering economic and safety objectives. Energy integration in biorefineries can be instrumental in reducing GHG emissions and enhancing profitability …”