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An Environmental Impact Assessment of a Power Plant Using Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) and Emergy Approach

Alizadeh, Sadegh | 2020

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  1. Type of Document: M.Sc. Thesis
  2. Language: Farsi
  3. Document No: 52613 (46)
  4. University: Sharif University of Technology
  5. Department: Energy Engineering
  6. Advisor(s): Avami, Akram
  7. Abstract:
  8. According to the increasing population, the demand for electricity and its generation increased significantly. Increasing production of energy cause to degrade the environment. Given that about 92 percent of Iran's electricity is supplied by fossil fuel power plants, the importance of considering the negative role of power plants in environmental degradation is twice. In this study, the environmental impacts and sustainability of two steam and combined cycle power plants in Iran have been evaluated using emergy and life cycle analyses and their integration. In addition, the effects of fuel change and application of emission control methods on results of the life cycle and emergy analyses were investigated. The results of life cycle assessment using CML-IA and Eco-indicator 99 methodologies represent that the combined cycle power plant is better than the steam power plant, as well as the upstream processes of power plants have the largest contribution to human health effects and ecosystem quality. Also, using life cycle perspective, the scenarios switching the power plant fuel to natural gas, and applying selective catalytic reduction technology are the best scenarios for the steam and combined cycle power plants, respectively. The results of emergy analysis represent that the combined cycle power plant is more sustainable than another. In addition, according to the results of the emergy evaluation of the power plants, both plants in base condition are more sustainable than the defined scenarios. Therefore, it seems that the secondary control technologies are not good options to increase the sustainability of the power plants, and applying towards primary control methods can be more useful. The results are showed that if the single score of life cycle and emergy sustainability were considered together, the scenarios of switching the fuel to natural gas and applying selective catalytic reduction technology would be the best-defined scenarios for the steam and combined cycle power plant, respectively. In addition, in this study, the effect of changing power plant fuel on life cycle environmental impact, as well as its emergy sustainability index under optimization problem was studied. According to the results, in the optimal condition of different scenarios, the scenario of switching the fuel to natural gas in both power plants can be introduced as the best scenario. In another section of the thesis, the social cost of carbon dioxide emission was assessed using life cycle and emergy analyses; the results show that the social cost of carbon dioxide emission is $120.09 and $151.65 per tonne for the steam and combined cycle power plants, respectively. Finally, the effect of uncertainty of fuel emergy transformity on the results was investigated; The results indicate that the uncertainties have insignificant effect on the results of the evaluations, and the ranking of the scenarios do not change in the mean values. Since the consumption of fossil fuels in the power plants is the most important factor in environmental impacts, two approaches to optimizing energy consumption and improving fuel quality are two useful approaches in managing and reducing environmental degradation caused by the power plant operation. The results of this thesis can be used to manage and improve the environmental impact of the power plants
  9. Keywords:
  10. Environmental Impact ; Power Plants ; Stability ; Life Cycle Model ; Environment ; Emergy ; Primary and Secondary Control Methods

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