Techno-economic evaluation of a polygeneration using agricultural residue - A case study for an Indian district

Presently, most of world electricity and other energy services are catered by fossil fuel resources. This is unsustainable in the long run both with respect to energy security and climate change problems. Fuel switching, specifically using biomass may partially address this problem. Polygeneration is an efficient way of delivering multiple utility outputs with one or more inputs. Decentralized small or large scale polygeneration using alternative fuels may be a future sustainable solution. In this paper, a techno-economic evaluation of a polygeneration with four utility outputs and rice straw as input has been reported. Results of the simulation and real-life data as inputs are used for the techno-economic analysis. The analysis is specific for a district in the state of West Bengal of India. Results show that such a plant has strong potential to qualify in techno-economic performance in addition to higher efficiency and lower CO2 emission. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.