International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control 5 (2011) 475–482 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijggc Exergoeconomic and exergoenvironmental analyses of a combined cycle power plant with chemical looping technology Fontina Petrakopoulou ∗ , Alicia Boyano, Marlene Cabrera, George Tsatsaronis Technische Universität Berlin, Institute for Energy Engineering, Marchstr. 18, D-10587 Berlin, Germany article info Article history: Received 22 October 2009 Received in revised form 4 May 2010 Accepted 13 June 2010 Available online 17 July 2010 Keywords: CO2 capture Chemical looping combustion Exergetic analysis Exergoeconomic analysis Exergoenvironmental analysis abstract CO 2 capture and storage from energy conversion systems is one option for reducing power plant CO 2 emissions to the atmosphere and for limiting the impact of fossil-fuel use on climate change. Among existing technologies, chemical looping combustion (CLC), an oxy-fuel approach, appears to be one of the most promising techniques, providing straightforward CO 2 capture with low energy requirements. This paper provides an evaluation of CLC technology from an economic and environmental perspective by comparing it with to a reference plant, a combined cycle power plant that includes no CO 2 capture. Two exergy-based methods, the exergoeconomic and the exergoenvironmental analyses, are used to determine the economic and environmental impacts, respectively. The applied methods facilitate the iterative optimization of energy conversion systems and lead towards the improvement of the effec- tiveness of the overall plant while decreasing the cost and the environmental impact of the generated product. For the plant with CLC, a high increase in the cost of electricity is observed, while at the same time the environmental impact decreases. © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Due to concerns about rising concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, CO 2 capture from power plants and its perma- nent storage in suitable geological formations (CCS) has become an important mitigation option for climate change (Herzog, 2001). There are currently a number of proposed methods for capturing the CO 2 produced in power plants. However, the majority of these techniques are energy intensive, resulting in a significant decrease in the overall efficiency of a system and a substantial increase in the monetary cost associated with the generated products. Considering these factors, we investigate the economic and eco- logical aspects of an oxy-fuel power plant operating with chemical looping combustion (CLC). Previous studies (Richter and Knoche, 1983; Hossain and de Lasa, 2008) show that CLC has the potential to become a relatively efficient and low cost technology. The pro- cess was first introduced by Lewis and Gilliland in 1954, in 1968 Abbreviations: CLC, chemical looping combustion; AR, air reactor; FR, fuel reac- tor; OC, oxygen carrier; HRSG, heat-recovery steam generator; ST, steam turbine; LP, low pressure; TRR, total revenue requirement; PEC, purchase equipment cost; FCI, fixed capital investment; COE, cost of electricity; CEPCI, chemical engineering plant cost index; GT, gas turbine; MEA, monoethanolamine. ∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +49 30 314 22851; fax: +49 30 314 21683. E-mail address: f.petrakopoulou@iet.tu-berlin.de (F. Petrakopoulou). URL: http://www.energietechnik.tu-berlin.de/ (F. Petrakopoulou). it was proposed by Knoche and Richter as an option for decreas- ing irreversibilities in combustion processes (1968), but later it was identified as having important advantages due to its nitrogen- free CO 2 production. This allows CO 2 separation with minimal thermodynamic losses and minimal contribution to NO x emissions (Hossain and de Lasa, 2008; Brandvoll and Bolland, 2004). In the CLC unit, the combustion products are kept separate from the air through the use of a metal oxide oxygen carrier (OC), and of two separate reactors for the oxygen separation and the fuel combustion. The OC is circulated between the two reactors, reacting with part of the air’s oxygen in the air reactor and transferring it to the reaction chamber (fuel reactor). Complete combustion of the fuel in the fuel reactor produces CO 2 , and water vapor, thus the CO 2 formed can be readily recovered by condensing the water vapor. This method eliminates the need for an additional, energy intensive CO 2 separation technique. The goal of this paper is to highlight differences between two theoretical energy conversion systems, a plant with CLC and a ref- erence plant (a three-pressure level combined cycle plant with one reheat stage) that includes no CO 2 capture, using exergoeconomic and exergoenvironmental analyses. The exergoeconomic analysis (Tsatsaronis and Winhold, 1985; Bejan et al., 1996; Tsatsaronis, 1999; Tsatsaronis and Cziesla, 2004) combines an exergetic analysis with an economic analysis to provide crucial information that is not obtainable through conventional thermodynamic analysis and simple economic evaluations. It is conducted at the component level, and specific costs associated 1750-5836/$ – see front matter © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ijggc.2010.06.008