Sugarcane Bagasse-Based Bioethanol Producing Biorefinery Plant Simulation and Technoeconomic Analysis
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Date
2019-10
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Energy has been the driving force for economic development. However, the source of energy
has become a big issue concerning the environmental pollution. Cellulosic bioethanol is one
of the different types of alternative energy sources so far innovated. It is promised to replace
the liquid fossil fuel and settle the fuel vs food competition. This area attracts researchers
from around the world due to its abundant resource and environmentally friendly production
process. Depending on that premises, this simulation-based bioethanol production research
paper was dealt to investigate some of the scale up problems and to study the economic
feasibility. The research paper carefully simulates the production process and analysis its
techno-economic. The conceptual model used on this paper encompasses feedstock
handling, pretreatment, saccharification, cofermentation, and production recovery. To
validate the equation used by Aspen Plus to simulate enzyme kinetics, the mathematical
equation for enzyme kinetics of hydrolysis and cofermentation were tested in Matlab. The
techno-economic analysis for the overall production process was then studied depending on
two models. The two models were bioethanol plant gate price assessment model (BPAM)
and feedstock cost estimation model (FCEM). During the process sensitivity analysis is also
performed using Aspen Plus built-in single objective function. The result of the sensitivity
analysis showed that, the conversion rate of cellulose to glucose, feedstock cost, and enzyme
loading have high factor in the minimum plant gate ethanol selling price determination. The
relationship between scaling up and ethanol production capacity was uniformly corelated.
The bioethanol for 5000 kg/h and 100000 kg/h of sugarcane bagasse was 296.518164 and
26443.563 respectively. This shows the positive correlation of the scale up and bioethanol
production. In addition to that, the overall simulation result showed that the minimum plant
gate ethanol selling price at breakeven point was $2.1174 per liter. This result indicates that,
even in the most optimistic scenario, the price of cellulosic ethanol is much more expensive
than the other similar fuels, gasoline. However, bioethanol can be competitive at some
conditions. Some of the conditions that makes the biorefinery plant competitive enough on
the local market are feed-in tariff and compulsory purchase of electricity, government direct
subsidy, tax preference and R&D. In addition to the above condition, public awareness is
also important. Finally, the researcher has recommended to government to revise the above
condition to entertain such type of environmentally friendly biorefinery plants.
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Keywords
Bagasse-Based Bioethanol, Biorefinery Plant Simulation, Technoeconomic Analysis