Capital cost clean technology

The capital cost of an IGCC plant for biomass or coal IS in the range of 1,500 to 2,000 per installed kW. A comparable natural gas fire facility costs about 750 to 1,000. The economics of biomass electricity based on IGCC technology depend on the relative cost of natural gas and biomass fuels. Biomass must be lower m cost than gas to pay back the additional capital cost of gas production and cleaning. A 1999 estimate suggestes that the biomass would have to be 3 per million Btiis cheaper than natural gas for biomass to be economical. 

The vendor estimates that a full-scale system designed to treat from 50 to 500 tons per day would have a treatment cost ranging from 50 to 80 per ton. The vendor also claims that this technology treats solids with high oil and water content for less than 40 per ton for recovery of clean oil and solids (D17050D). No information was available on capital cost for the full-scale system, and it should be noted that no full-scale application has been conducted (D148770,... 

Process intensification is one of the chemical engineering solutions to clean technology. The main benefits are often lower energy uses, lower capital costs and increased throughput from a smaller plant derived from different engineering conceptual designs. The next generation of plants will be smaller, cheaper, and more environmentally friendly to run. 

The capital for a production plant was estimated excluding the site acquisition cost. The total cost will, of course, vary somewhat from location to location but it was clear that it would be less than for an equivalent operation using present day technology (e.g., differential flotation followed by separate and distant smelting and refining of clean zinc, lead and copper concentrates). The standard plants would be replaced with a bulk concentrator, a single smelter and refineries. The capital cost comparison is not quite so... 

Finally, one must recognize that other than simple filtration, all oil treatment operations bring in added equipment, complexity in operation due to unfamiliar technology and added capital cost. All these factors need to be considered carefully before undertaking any oil cleaning step. The user must analyze the operation and determine the source of oil... 

These use new brushless servo motor technology to power the various machine movements. The capital cost of all-electric machines is higher than that of conventional machines but the energy consumption in production is much lower. This is because the electric motors run only on demand, and there are no losses due to energy conversion, pipelines, or throttling. The elimination of hydraulic oil makes the all-electric machines inherently cleaner, so these machines are attractive for sterile or clean room use. There is also evidence that all-electric machine movements can be resolved with a higher degree of precision and repeatability than hydraulic systems. 

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