Techno-economic assessment of bioethanol production from wheat straw: a case study of Iran

A process of ethanol production from wheat straw in Iran was simulated using SuperPro Designer. Wheat is the main cereal crop in Iran. Khuzestan Province was selected as a potential location for the construction of plant. A method was developed to estimate the plant capacity. The base plant size in Khuzestan was estimated to be 316 t day(-1). The effect of plant size, logistics of residue collection, wheat yield, and agreements with local farmers on the profitability was calculated, and the minimum selling price was determined for different scenarios. In addition, the sensitivity analysis and economic risk assessment were conducted. The operating cost was mainly sensitive to the wheat straw and enzyme costs. The Monte Carlo simulation results showed that the risk of the base case biorefinery is fairly acceptable at moderate to high selling prices, and increasing the plant size could lessen the risk at lower ethanol selling prices.