Reducing the carbon footprint of cement industry by post-combustion CO2 capture: Techno-economic and environmental assessment of a CCS project in Romania

Reducing the carbon dioxide emissions from the energy-intensive industrial sectors is of great importance in the fight against climate change. The cement industry is responsible for about 5% of global CO2 emissions. In this article, two reactive absorption and adsorption post-combustion CO2 capture methods are assessed in conjunction with cement production. The gas-liquid absorption method uses alkanolamine (MDEA) as chemical solvent and the gas-solid adsorption method uses calcium looping (CaL) technology. The carbon capture rate is set to 90%. The analysis considers a conventional size of cement plant (1 Mt/y) focusing on mass and energy integration aspects of the carbon capture unit as well as quantification of main techno-economic and environmental indicators of the cement plant with carbon capture. The evaluated designs were modelled and simulated, the mass and energy balances being used to assess the overall performances. For comparison reason, a cement plant without carbon capture was also considered to assess the energy and cost penalties for the carbon capture designs. The analysis shows that the CaL system has significant technical and economic advantages compared to the gas-liquid absorption case (e.g. higher energy efficiency, lower capital, operational and maintenance (O&M), cement production and CO2 avoidance costs).