eco-Technoeconomic-Analysis of Steel Manufacturing Off-gas Valorization

Abstract

The steel manufacturing industry is one of the largest emitters of CO2, accounting for upwards of 8.8% of all anthropogenic CO2 emissions. The governments are charging taxes on CO2 emissions, which incentivize the industry to further reduce CO2 emissions. At present, much of the CO2, produced in the steel manufacturing process occurs as a result of coke oven and blast furnace gas by-products. As such, two major strategies have been proposed to reduce steel-manufacturing-related CO2 emissions: producing more electricity via optimized combined cycle power plants (CCPP), and converting off-gas by-products into methanol (CBMeOH). The present research consists of an economic and environmental analysis of the status quo, CCPP, and CBMeOH systems for five locations: Ontario, the USA, Finland, Mexico, and China. The economic analysis considered factors such as carbon tax, electricity price, methanol price, electricity carbon intensity, power purchasing parity, and income tax. In the CCPP process, desulphurization is conducted using ProMax with MDEA as the solvent, while the CBMeOH process uses a membrane to separate the bulk H2S, with organic sulfurs such as thiophene being removed via CO2+steam reforming and middle-temperature removal. The results of the economic analysis revealed the CBMeOH plant to be the most profitable in Ontario, the USA, China, and Mexico, while the CCPP system was shown to be the most profitable in Finland. The environmental analysis was conducted using the TRACI, CML-IA, ReCiPe2016, and IMPACT2002+ tools in SimaPro V9, with the results showing the CBMeOH system to be the most environmentally option in Ontario, Finland, and China, and the CCPP system as the most environmentally friendly option in the USA and Mexico.