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A Techno-Economic Assessment of Renewable Diesel and Gasoline Production from Aspen Hardwood

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Abstract

In this study, we developed a techno-economic model to estimate the production cost of renewable diesel and gasoline from aspen woodchips through fast pyrolysis-based bio-oil and its subsequent hydroprocessing. The whole pathway includes the conversion of woodchip biomass to bio-oil through fast pyrolysis followed by upgrading to transportation fuels via hydroprocessing. Experiments were carried out to develop for the process model. This detailed process and techno-economic study was done based on 2000 dry t day−1 aspen woodchips (base case capacity), from which we estimated the cost to produce renewable diesel and gasoline. For this base case, using the present method, 148.81 ML year−1 of renewable diesel and 99.21 ML year−1 of gasoline using merchant hydrogen can be produced. The production costs of renewable diesel and gasoline for 2000 t day−1 are 1.09 and 1.04$ L−1, respectively. We also studied the effect of changing the scale of the facility from 500 to 5000 t day−1 on the production costs of renewable diesel and gasoline. The economic optimum plant size (the capacity at which fuel production cost is lowest) was determined to be 3000 t day−1. Finally, we carried out sensitivity and uncertainty analyses for the base case and determined that production cost is most sensitive to bio-oil yield and internal rate of return (IRR).

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Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to North West Upgrading, Inc. (NWRP-Kumar RES0015306) and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) (Grant No.: IRCPJ 436795 & 436794—2011) (NSERC CRDPJ 434956-12 KUMAR) for providing financial support to do this research. Astrid Blodgett is thanked for her editorial assistance. The funding was supported by Cenvous Energy Endowed Chair in Environmental Engineering.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mechanical Engineering, 10-263 Donadeo Innovation Centre for Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, T6G 1H9, Canada

    Madhumita Patel, Adetoyese Olajire Oyedun & Amit Kumar

  2. Department of Chemical and Material Engineering, Donadeo Innovation Centre for Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, T6G 1H9, Canada

    Rajender Gupta

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  1. Madhumita Patel
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Correspondence to Amit Kumar.

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Patel, M., Oyedun, A.O., Kumar, A. et al. A Techno-Economic Assessment of Renewable Diesel and Gasoline Production from Aspen Hardwood. Waste Biomass Valor 10, 2745–2760 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12649-018-0359-x

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