Abstract
Today, conventional heat and power production systems are facing significant operational challenges due to the integration of time-variable renewable energy sources (e.g., wind, solar). In addition, the transition to a low-carbon economy requires the deployment of innovative energy production systems with low CO2 emissions. The chemical looping combustion technology is a promising option to provide a system with, simultaneously, high energy efficiency and low carbon emissions. This work assesses the natural gas-based chemical looping combusting system for time-flexible production of power with almost total decarbonization (carbon capture rate > 99 %). The iron oxide looping system was assessed as an illustrative thermo-chemical process for energy conversion and storage. The size of investigated concept generates 100 MW net power. Two chemical looping combustion configurations were evaluated as follow: a base-load option and a time flexible one using the feature of oxygen carrier storage (in both reduced and oxidized forms). As the overall evaluation of performance shows, the flexible operation of chemical looping combustion system improves the overall performance e.g., reduction of specific capital cost up to 3 %, reduction of power cost up to 2 %, reduction of CO2 capture cost up to 8 %.
