‘We make more and more use of decision support tools in our projects’, says Programme Manager Geoffrey Schouten of the Institute for Sustainable Process Technology in Amersfoort. The Steel2Chemicals (S2C) project is an example. ‘It is about converting large quantities of CO2 and CO-rich blast furnace gases from the steel industry into chemical
building blocks for the chemical industry. We use Quo Mare’s data-driven Techno-Economic Analysis of Complex Option Spaces model (TEACOS) to support in making the right choices.’
The S2C project, aimed at minimising total CO2 emissions by 2050, confronted the parties involved with a myriad of options. Schouten sums up: ‘You can make naphtha, methanol, ethanol or hydrogen from steel gases - or combinations of these. The optimal choice depends on available technologies, developing infrastructure and cost curves of equipment and emission tax over time. All in all, there are just too many options to oversee without decision support.’
Quo Mare calculates an optimised pathway towards a desired goal with the optimised investment choices, moments and locations based on the inputs in their support model TEACOS. Associate at Quo Mare Nort Thijssen: ‘Generic deployment of TEACOS offers a proof of concept. The first phase shows parties what additional information they would want to have in the sequel.’
Schouten: ‘These first insights can then be used for targeted iterations and tweaks. This allows the parties involved to get a grip on options related to uncertainties, of which the price development of CO2 emissions over time is just one.’ At present, the project is in this iteration phase, says Thijssen: ‘In this stage, we carry out specific studies with individual parties.’
‘TEACOS consists of logic modelled in algebraic formulas, based on physical and chemical parameters’, says Thijssen. ‘The logic behind the model is well described. Processes such as the mass balances and energy balances as well as econometric relationships included are based on first principles.’