Optimal planning of hybrid power generation system towards low carbon development

In Malaysia, the energy sector is identified as one of the major carbon dioxide (CO2) emitters. Electricity in Malaysia is primarily generated from coal, natural gas, diesel, oil and hydro. The government of Malaysia encourages power producers to shift towards the use of renewable energy (RE) and reduce their reliance on fossil fuels. There is a clear need for a systematic method to sustainably plan the fleet-wide electricity generation and capacity expansion towards fulfilling the forecasted electricity demand and simultaneously meet the emission reduction target. A comprehensive superstructure consisting o f all existing (i.e. Pulverized Coal (PC), Natural Gas Open Cycle (NGOC)) and new power generation technologies (i.e., Natural Gas Combined Cycle (NGCC), nuclear, solar, biom ass and M unicipal Solid W aste (M SW )) was constructed at the early stage of model development in this study. Towards this end, three different models have been developed and implemented in the General Algebraic Modeling System (GAMS) as follows: 1) Single period model for electricity generation mix that is designed to satisfy the electricity demand until the year 2020 for Peninsular Malaysia, 2) Multi period model for selection o f power generation technology that is designed to satisfy the forecasted electricity demand from year 2012 to 2025 in Iskandar Malaysia (IM) and 3) Multi-period optimization model that is developed to determine the optimal location o f new RE generation stations to reduce transmission losses and transportation cost in IM. Options are made available by models 1 and 2 to switch the coal plants to natural gas power plants and to increase the use o f renewable energy in order to meet CO2 target and to minimize cost. Model 3 is capable o f predicting the cost-optimal generation capacity, type o f biomass-energy conversion technology and location for the construction and operation of new biomass power plants. The models can provide vital tools to assist the government in policy making

Techno-economic assessment of integrated power plant with methanation

Greenhouse gaseous (GHG) emissions increment is driven by economic and population growth which are getting higher. This has led to the increase of atmospheric concentration of CO 2. Due to this situation, carbon capture utilisation and storage (CCUS) seems to be promising approach to reduce emission of CO 2. Among all the carbon utilisation strategies available, methanation is promising. In the perspective of integrated power plant with methanation, the process is appropriate and relatively simpler due to availability of hydrogen as its main constituent. Prior to the goal of abatement of greenhouse gases emission, hydrogen production by using renewable energy technology which is electrolysis seems to be one of the solution towards future energy security. This study performed a techno economic assessment of integrated power plant with methanation with a case study in Iskandar Malaysia. From the economic assessment results, highest profit is generated when PEM is used in electrolysis process and CIS is used as solar panel due to its high efficiency and low capital expenditure (CAPEX). This cost competitiveness can be enhanced selling O 2 by product produced from electrolysis process and recycling the catalyst for methanation process. Further studies can be extended by including variation of parameter for a better optimisation superstructure

Granular-activated carbon from Mukah coal using carbon dioxide activation

A study was conducted on Mukah coal using fixed bed reactor and one step activation with varying resident time and temperatures. CO2 gas was used for the activation process. The one-step continuous process comprised of carbonization and activation processes. The burn off analysis for 80 grams of Mukah coal was done to obtain volatiles removal at various carbonization temperatures. The results obtained showed that at 900oC, the percentages of burn off and the remaining weight were 42.2% and 57.8% respectively. Micrometrics ASAP2010 was used to analyze Mukah coal activated carbon in obtaining the BET surface area, the micropore area, and the average pore diameter. The results obtained indicated that activation at 900oC gave the highest BET surface area with 675m2/g, while the highest micropore area with 427 m2/g was obtained at 800oC. In addition, the average pore diameter range was within 18.5 to 26.4 A

Optimal planning of renewable energy-integrated electricity generation schemes with CO2 reduction target

This paper presents a Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) model that was developed for the optimalplanning of electricitygenerationschemes for a nation to meet a specified CO2 emission target. The model was developed and implemented in General Algebraic Modeling System (GAMS) for the fleet of electricitygeneration in Peninsular Malaysia. In order to reduce the CO2 emissions by 50% from current CO2 emission level, the optimizer selected a scheme which includes Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC), Natural Gas Combined Cycle (NGCC), nuclear and biomass from landfill gas and palm oil residues. It was predicted that Malaysia has potential to generate up to nine percent of electricity from renewableenergy (RE) based on the available sources of RE in Malaysia

Potential of energy recovery from an integrated palm oil mill with biogas power plant

The Malaysian palm oil industry has made significant contribution to the country's gross domestic product (GDP) due to the increasing global demand of palm oil over the past decades. However, it is undoubtedly a sector that consumes enormous energy and water. With the uprising concerns of the energy resource shortage and global warming, several green technology policies such as the feed-in-tariff policy have been implemented by government to accelerate the sustainable development of palm oil industry in Malaysia. The establishment of feed-in-tariff has successfully increased the number of palm oil mills that are completed with biogas facilities. Recent studies indicate that there are significant amounts of waste heat released from biogas power plant are utilisable as heat source for palm oil mill processes. As an initiative to develop the research of optimizing the energy efficiency of integrated palm oil mill with the biogas power plant, this study is directed toward the analysis of energy balance and material balance of an integrated palm oil mill with biogas power plant which covered both the palm oil milling process energy demand and the biogas power plant waste heat potential analysis. An integrated palm oil mill with biogas power plant running with 120 t/h fresh fruit bunches input was evaluated. The result indicates that there were a total of 3491.66 kW waste heat which corresponded to 46.82 % of the total biogas engine energy input could be recovered for process heating. By fully utilising the biogas plant waste heat as process heating for palm oil mill processes, it is estimated that up to 9.46 % of the total energy supplied could be saved

Effect of fossil fuel price fluctuations on electricity planning comprising renewable energy

Electricity generation mix in Malaysia largely relies on fossil fuel including coal, natural gas (NG), diesel and fuel oil. In the Ninth Malaysia Plan, the government aims to achieve 5% electricity generation mix from renewable energy (RE). Nevertheless, until now, RE contributes less than 1% of the national electricity generation mix. In spite of its emission benefits, NG prices volatility have encouraged calls for investments in RE. Unfortunately, NG price in Malaysia is highly subsidized, thereby making RE implementation unattractive. This article addresses the impact of NG price (with and without subsidies) on RE-integrated electricity generation in Malaysia. The results show that a small increment in NG price will not affect the selection of RE source for electricity generation. If RE electricity generation is chosen, it will slightly increase the cost of electricity (COE) by 2.2 cents/kWh. Without NG subsidies, this cost can be translated to an additional 3 cents/kWh of CO

Two-stages carbon emission pinch analysis for integrated system of renewable energy and electric vehicle

The introduction of electric vehicles to the transportation fleet has merged the power generation and transportation sectors into an integrated system. Rather than fuel sources, electricity is used to charge electric vehicles, so these vehicles play a vital role as an important green technology that could reduce carbon emissions in the transportation sector. This study aimed to develop a multi-stage carbon emission pinch analysis for an integrated system to optimise the energy mix for electricity generation. In the first stage, the minimum number of electric vehicles required to reduce transportation emissions was determined. In the second stage, the optimal energy mix for power generation sector was determined while including the electricity demand for the electric vehicle. Four scenarios, namely the business-as-usual scenario (S1); the public transport utilization scenario (S2); the electrification of vehicle scenario (S3); and the Integrated-Policies scenario (S4) were developed based on Peninsular Malaysia as a case study, to analyse the impact of different mitigation strategies on the country's economy. S1 was set as baseline for all the cases i.e., without any mitigation strategies. The results reveal that S4 was the best scenario, yielding a total cost saving percentage of 51.42 % compared to S1. For the power generation sector, 52 % of renewable energy (solar PV, biomass and biogas) utilisation would be needed in the energy mix to achieve the emission reduction target

Water-Energy Nexus Cascade Analysis (WENCA) for simultaneous water-energy system optimisation

This paper presents a new numerical method called the Water-Energy Nexus Cascade Analysis (WENCA), developed based on the principal of Pinch Analysis. Water and energy are both valuable resources that are majorly used in industrial processes. Both water and energy are interdependent where increasing water demand will increase the energy demand and vice versa. In this paper, WENCA is introduced to simultaneously optimise both water and energy system that is interdependent. The methodology applies Cascade Analysis to individually optimise both system. As both systems are interdependent, altering one of the system will result in a change to the other system. An iterative method is then introduced to converge the analysis to obtain the optimal result for both systems. A case study comprising of both electricity and water demand of 6,875 kWh and 3,000 m3 from a residential area with 1,000 unit of houses is applied in this work. The electricity demand is met using fuel cell where hydrogen is produced through coal gasification (which utilised water as it raw material), a water treatment plant (WTP) is also introduced for water treatment to fulfil the water demands. The optimal result reveals that the WTP capacity is 3,200.73 m3, its corresponding water storage tank capacity is 175 m3, hydrogen power plant is 9 MW and its corresponding energy storage capacity is 4.13 MW

Integrated biomass power plant and storage for peak load management

This paper presents a simulation based linear programming model of a biomass power plant integrated with energy storage (ES) system for peak load demand management. The integrated biomass power plant using biomass bubbling fluidized bed technology (BBFB) with ES is then compared to a biomass power plant without ES. The results revealed that the integrated BBFB with ES can significantly increase the economics of the system from a total deficit of $195528 (without ES) to a total profit of$227072.70 (with ES) over a 20. years period. The optimum size of BBFB power plant is 140. kW, while the capacity of NaS battery is 257 kWh with a maximum discharge rate (power) of 107.0. kW

Removal of chromium (VI) with Aliquat 336 impregnated in Amberlite XAD-16. I. batch mode sorption studies

This work investigates the removal of chromium (VI) from aqueous solutions using solvent impregnated resin (SIR). The solvent impregnated resin was formed by impregnating Amberlite XAD-16 resin with Aliquat 336 extractant. Solvent impregnated resins were prepared in three different concentrations; 0.5, 1.0 and 2.0 grams Aliquat 336 per gram XAD-16. The solvent impregnated resin was formed using the wet method. The effect of pH on the sorption of chromium (VI) ions was investigated; equilibrium experiments were carried out with the different concentrations of solvent impregnated resin to test the sorption capacity. It was found that the sorption of chromium (VI) was most effective at pH 6. It was found that 90% removal was achieved under optimal conditions. The adsorption capasity for chromium was found to be 0.47, 0.56 and 0.63 mmol/g for 0.5, 1.0 and 2.0 g/g, respectivel