Waste-to-energy with CO2 capture: a feasibility study towards renewable energy transition in Ilha Grande - RJ, Brazil
Ilha Grande, in Rio de Janeiro, has become one of Brazil’s top tourist destinations in recent years, but even then, it continues to face frequent and prolonged blackouts. These outages force residents to rely on expensive and polluting diesel generators for electricity. This work evaluates the feasi...
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| Tipo de recurso: | tesis de maestría |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2025 |
| País: | España |
| Institución: | Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) |
| Repositorio: | UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC |
| Idioma: | inglés |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:upcommons.upc.edu:2117/441736 |
| Acceso en línea: | https://hdl.handle.net/2117/441736 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | Renewable energy sources Energy conversion Waste products Energies renovables Conversió d'energia Residus Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Energies |
| Sumario: | Ilha Grande, in Rio de Janeiro, has become one of Brazil’s top tourist destinations in recent years, but even then, it continues to face frequent and prolonged blackouts. These outages force residents to rely on expensive and polluting diesel generators for electricity. This work evaluates the feasibility of a combustion-based waste-to-energy (WTE) plant in Vila do Abraão, the island’s most prolific town, comparing a standard combustion system with two variations that incorporate post-combustion carbon capture and storage (CCS), one of them with steam extraction. First, the electricity demand of the town is quantified, and municipal solid waste (MSW) streams are characterized via literature data. The three plant configurations are modeled in Aspen HYSYS®, considering seasonal fluctuations in waste flowrates. Then, the total equipment is sized, and an economic analysis is performed, calculating the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), the net present value (NPV), the cash flow and the CO2 abatement cost, among other important indicators. The results show that with current waste generation, both CCS-equipped configurations cover less than 20% of Abraão’s electricity needs. Due to the low capacity of the plant, revenues from electricity and CO2 for normal current prices are not capable of returning the investment, nor overcoming the annual expenses, thus proving economically unfeasible. Although quantifying the economic and carbon savings that originate from treating waste on-site could leverage the economic performance, the findings suggest the need to explore alternative solutions to solve Ilha Grande’s ongoing power reliability problems. |
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