• Energy Research

Publicly available toolkits for cost calculation in renewable energy projects were reviewed, and their main characteristics, strengths and weaknesses identified. An original Life-Cycle Cost (LCC) modelling toolkit was developed to address some of the identified shortcomings, and to facilitate the calculation of costs of electrical and thermal energy from biomass-based processing pathways. The toolkit was used to compare the Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) for electricity and/or heat generation for a ‘Bioenergy Case’, after the adoption of bioenergy technology, and compared with equivalent costs under a business-as-usual ‘Base Case’, for selected commercial demand sectors in Sub-Saharan Africa, within a 10 kW to 5 MW scale range. Case Studies of the toolkit’s application are described for a smallholder tea factory in Kenya, a wood processing enterprise in Tanzania and an oil palm mill in Ghana, which illustrate its ability to model energy production based on both combustion and anaerobic digestion, under various heat, power and combined heat and power configurations. Sensitivity analysis was carried out to determine the effect on LCOEheatand LCOEelectricityof adjustments in key operating parameters, such as biomass feedstock cost, feed-in tariff for export of surplus power to the grid or on-site energy demand. The versatility of the LCC toolkit enables bioenergy projects to be modelled from different perspectives (biomass feedstock diversification, conversion pathways or business models) and for different users (plant managers, project developers or potential investors), and it can be customised and adapted as prices, legislation and technical aspects evolve with time.

This paper addresses the link between data, metrics, and the paths from cause to effect in urban sustainability and livability frameworks. The first section thoroughly discusses the different existing frameworks for evaluating sustainability and livability goals for urban communities. In the results section, a qualitative and quantitative analysis of a comprehensive list of frameworks that evaluate sustainability and livability in cities is elaborated, with a thorough post-process of the different schemes from an epistemological perspective to analyze the subjectivities implicit in any urban-level sustainability framework. Finally, in the discussion section, two main aspects are tackled. The first is the development of a proposal for a set of indicators that incorporates the best of the different frameworks analyzed. The second aspect deals with the methodology of implementation of these frameworks. Here, the authors point out the weaknesses of current urban-level sustainability frameworks and their main components, and they propose a set of criteria to overcome the different detected gaps. All these steps have helped the authors establish a clear roadmap for developing the platform TOOLS4Cities that can help set a future reference methodology for urban sustainability evaluation.

Abstract The European study entitled: “Market Potential Analysis for Introduction of Hydrogen Energy Technology in Stand-Alone Power Systems (H-SAPS)” aimed to establish a broad understanding of the market potential for H-SAPS and provide a basis for promoting in wide scale new technological applications. The scope of the study was limited to small and medium installations, up to a few hundred kW power rating and based on RE as the primary energy source. The potential for hydrogen technology in SAPS was investigated through an assessment of the technical potential for hydrogen, the market analysis and the evaluation of external factors. The results are mostly directed towards action by governments and the research community but also industry involvement is identified. The results include targeted market research, establishment of individual cost targets, regulatory changes to facilitate alternative grid solutions, information and capacity building, focused technology research and bridging the technology gaps.

AbstractMany remote rural communities are ignored in rural electrification plans due to their remoteness or their relatively low demand potential. Many of those communities are rural agricultural villages that cultivate crops whose residue is a potential solid biomass fuel for power generation using appropriate technologies. This research proposes a feasibility study of trigeneration (heat, power and cold) from small farm typologies with enough clustered crop residue in selected communities in Ghana, as well as definition (prototype level) of the best generation technology. A sample of 11 districts in Ghana were surveyed in order to assess the levels of agricultural waste produced in small holder farms and their possible clustering for supplying these wastes to a hypothetical centralized trigeneration plant. The results obtained in terms of plant capacity, biomass waste yields, energy output flows and economic analysis indicate good prospects for the deployment of trigeneration as a solution in rural agricultural areas of Sub-Saharan Africa