Performance assessment of first generation oxy-coal power plants through an exergy-based process integration methodology

Among the different cases considered in this study, recirculation of the flue gas before the regenerative heater with an advanced ASU and a double-column CPU (compression and purification unit) leads to the highest NPE (net plant efficiency). For this case, the NPE is 39.1 % based on the lower heating value (7 %-pts energy penalty), which corresponds to a 6.5% improvement compared to the base-case plant. When high-purity CO2 is desired, the energy penalty is increased by 0.2 %-pts for the same configuration.