An energetic and economic analysis of power productive gas expansion stations for employing combined heat and power

The feasibility of employing combined heat and power (CHP) systems for providing the required heat in power productive gas expansion stations (PPGES) has been studied. However, there is no study in the literature indicating which PPGES is an economically efficient host for the CHP technology. In this work, comprehensive energetic and economic analyses are accomplished on several gas expansion stations (GES) in Iran. The corresponding power generation units and CHP systems of each of these stations are sized and designed. Net present value (NPV) is the economic method of used for the sizing and design procedure. The novel technical criterion of relative heating demand (RHD) which makes the economic index of relative NPV (RNPV) equal to zero determined the eligible PPGESs for being equipped with a CHP unit. The results show that a PPGES might be an appropriate host for a properly sized and designed CHP system if its RHD value is greater than 0.35. This value for the simple GESs was found as 0.23.