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Energy or Material Savings? Exergy replacement cost applied to a thermoeconomic analysis of three different resource-intensive industries

Abstract:

Thermoeconomics is largely used to assess industries where energy flows come into play. However, how could material flows be assessed? Conventional exergy analysis uses chemical exergy, but it does not reflect their industrial value. Exergy Replacement Cost (ERC) is proposed to evaluate the material resources that come from natural deposits. It is a novelty with respect to the conventional exergy analysis that allows to assess material efficiency in industries in a fairer way. Material and energy efficiency must be optimized, because there are scenarios where material savings increases, but the energy ones decreases. This paper is focused in the application of ERC concept to a thermoeconomic analysis of three resource-intensive industries, such as a cement plant, a fertilizer factory and a ceramic production plant. It has been demonstrated that material efficiency can be assessed fairly in this way. The existing parameters of the industries have been proposed as the reference case. New scenarios have been analyzed so as to study the potential for improvement in terms of exergy consumption with respect to the reference case. These exergy savings are related to both energy and non-energy sources.