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Title: Economic and environmental analysis to evaluate the potential value of co-optima diesel bioblendstocks to petroleum refiners

Abstract

The U.S. petroleum refining sector is undergoing a period of historic transformation, catalyzed by the decarbonization of the U.S. economy. Diesel-boiling-range bioblendstocks have gained traction, owing to their superior fuel properties and environmental performance as compared to traditional petroleum fuels. Here, this work couples refinery linear programming models with life cycle assessment to quantify the potential economic and environmental benefits, and trade-offs, of blending diesel-boiling-range bioblendstocks at petroleum refineries. Linear programming models were developed in Aspen Process Industry Modeling Systems (PIMS) for three representative petroleum refinery configurations of differing complexity. Seven diesel-boiling-range bioblendstocks: 4-butoxyheptane, 5-ethyl-4-propylnonane, soy biodiesel, sludge hydrothermal liquefaction diesel, polyoxymethylene ethers, renewable diesel, and hexyl hexanoate, were investigated to identify key fuel properties that influence refineries’ economics and to track the effect of adding bioblendstocks on refinery-wide cradle-to-gate greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions. These analyses considered blending levels from 10 to 30 vol% and fuel demand projections over the period 2040 to 2050. This analysis determines that bioblendstock sulfur content and cetane number are the primary fuel attributes with the potential to provide value to refiners. Life cycle assessment results indicate that the use of diesel-boiling-range bioblendstocks can reduce cradle-to-gate refinery GHG emissions by up to ~ 40 %more » relative to conventional refinery operations when considering carbon uptake in the supply chain of the bioblendstock. Refinery-wide marginal GHG abatement costs range from 120 to 3,600 USD2016/metric tons carbon dioxide equivalent avoided across the scenarios evaluated. Reducing the price of bioblendstocks is identified as a key to their adoption.« less

Authors:
 [1];  [2];  [1];  [2];  [3];  [3];  [3]; ORCiD logo [1]; ORCiD logo [4];  [5];  [5];  [3];  [3]
  1. Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
  2. Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Lemont, IL (United States)
  3. National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
  4. Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
  5. Eastern Research Group, Inc., Lexington, MA (United States)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States); Idaho National Laboratory (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Transportation Office. Bioenergy Technologies Office; USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Transportation Office. Vehicle Technologies Office; USDOE Office of Nuclear Energy (NE)
OSTI Identifier:
1897740
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1903284
Report Number(s):
PNNL-SA-169554; INL/JOU-22-66549-Rev000
Journal ID: ISSN 0016-2361
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC05-76RL01830; AC07-05ID14517
Resource Type:
Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Fuel
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 333; Journal Issue: 1; Journal ID: ISSN 0016-2361
Publisher:
Elsevier
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
02 PETROLEUM; refinery impact analysis; diesel-range bio-blendstocks; life-cycle analysis; economic value; 09 BIOMASS FUELS

Citation Formats

Jiang, Yuan, Zaimes, Greg G., Li, Shuyun, Hawkins, Troy R., Singh, Avantika, Carlson, Nicholas, Talmadge, Michael, Gaspar, Daniel J., Ramirez-Corresdores, Magdalena M., Beck, Andrew W., Young, Ben, Sittler, Lauren, and Brooker, Aaron. Economic and environmental analysis to evaluate the potential value of co-optima diesel bioblendstocks to petroleum refiners. United States: N. p., 2022. Web. doi:10.1016/j.fuel.2022.126233.
Jiang, Yuan, Zaimes, Greg G., Li, Shuyun, Hawkins, Troy R., Singh, Avantika, Carlson, Nicholas, Talmadge, Michael, Gaspar, Daniel J., Ramirez-Corresdores, Magdalena M., Beck, Andrew W., Young, Ben, Sittler, Lauren, & Brooker, Aaron. Economic and environmental analysis to evaluate the potential value of co-optima diesel bioblendstocks to petroleum refiners. United States. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuel.2022.126233
Jiang, Yuan, Zaimes, Greg G., Li, Shuyun, Hawkins, Troy R., Singh, Avantika, Carlson, Nicholas, Talmadge, Michael, Gaspar, Daniel J., Ramirez-Corresdores, Magdalena M., Beck, Andrew W., Young, Ben, Sittler, Lauren, and Brooker, Aaron. Thu . "Economic and environmental analysis to evaluate the potential value of co-optima diesel bioblendstocks to petroleum refiners". United States. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuel.2022.126233. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1897740.
@article{osti_1897740,
title = {Economic and environmental analysis to evaluate the potential value of co-optima diesel bioblendstocks to petroleum refiners},
author = {Jiang, Yuan and Zaimes, Greg G. and Li, Shuyun and Hawkins, Troy R. and Singh, Avantika and Carlson, Nicholas and Talmadge, Michael and Gaspar, Daniel J. and Ramirez-Corresdores, Magdalena M. and Beck, Andrew W. and Young, Ben and Sittler, Lauren and Brooker, Aaron},
abstractNote = {The U.S. petroleum refining sector is undergoing a period of historic transformation, catalyzed by the decarbonization of the U.S. economy. Diesel-boiling-range bioblendstocks have gained traction, owing to their superior fuel properties and environmental performance as compared to traditional petroleum fuels. Here, this work couples refinery linear programming models with life cycle assessment to quantify the potential economic and environmental benefits, and trade-offs, of blending diesel-boiling-range bioblendstocks at petroleum refineries. Linear programming models were developed in Aspen Process Industry Modeling Systems (PIMS) for three representative petroleum refinery configurations of differing complexity. Seven diesel-boiling-range bioblendstocks: 4-butoxyheptane, 5-ethyl-4-propylnonane, soy biodiesel, sludge hydrothermal liquefaction diesel, polyoxymethylene ethers, renewable diesel, and hexyl hexanoate, were investigated to identify key fuel properties that influence refineries’ economics and to track the effect of adding bioblendstocks on refinery-wide cradle-to-gate greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions. These analyses considered blending levels from 10 to 30 vol% and fuel demand projections over the period 2040 to 2050. This analysis determines that bioblendstock sulfur content and cetane number are the primary fuel attributes with the potential to provide value to refiners. Life cycle assessment results indicate that the use of diesel-boiling-range bioblendstocks can reduce cradle-to-gate refinery GHG emissions by up to ~ 40 % relative to conventional refinery operations when considering carbon uptake in the supply chain of the bioblendstock. Refinery-wide marginal GHG abatement costs range from 120 to 3,600 USD2016/metric tons carbon dioxide equivalent avoided across the scenarios evaluated. Reducing the price of bioblendstocks is identified as a key to their adoption.},
doi = {10.1016/j.fuel.2022.126233},
journal = {Fuel},
number = 1,
volume = 333,
place = {United States},
year = {Thu Oct 20 00:00:00 EDT 2022},
month = {Thu Oct 20 00:00:00 EDT 2022}
}

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