Techno-economic review of carbon capture : Potential and profitability in Oulu region

• Main Author: Salo, Meri
• Other Authors: Tekniikan ja luonnontieteiden tiedekunta - Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences, Tampere University
• Format: Master Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: 2023
• Subjects: Ympäristö- ja energiatekniikan DI-ohjelma - Programme in Environmental and Energy Engineering; Northern Finland
• Online Access: https://trepo.tuni.fi/handle/10024/151036

Elevated levels of greenhouse gases such as CO2 in the atmosphere are accelerating global warming and leading to extreme weather events. It is therefore crucial to limit the amount of CO2 released into the atmosphere. Various global and national goals have been set to mitigate climate change and CO2 emissions. One of the solutions could be carbon capture. Carbon capture relates to the processes that can capture CO2 from point sources or directly from the atmosphere, which can then be utilized or stored long-term, limiting the amount of CO2 that is emitted into the atmosphere. This study aimed to evaluate the feasibility and potential of biogenic carbon capture in select businesses in Northern Finland with the help of a techno-economic analysis. In addition, the goal of the study was to find out what carbon capture technologies are available, the quality of CO2 produced, the amount of CO2 emissions in the case study companies and how interested the companies are in carbon capture. The transport, utilization and storage of the captured CO2 were excluded from the scope of this study. Several carbon capture technologies were reviewed in this work: chemical absorption, physical adsorption, membrane separation, chemical looping combustion, calcium looping, cryogenic capture and oxy-fuel combustion. In addition, biogenic CO2 sources such as pulp and board manufacturing, combined heat and power and biogas production were studied, and a short literature review on the previous techno-economic analyses on carbon capture was carried out. It was found that chemical absorption using monoethanolamine was the best suited technology for the analysis due to it being a commercially available and well-researched technology as well as the fact that it can produce a high-quality stream of 99.6–99.8% CO2. The techno-economic analysis was carried out for the pulp and linerboard mill and a combined heat and power plant due to their higher CO2 emissions and therefore most potential. The case study companies were also interviewed about ...