Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

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Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/energy

Supercritical steam cycles and biomass integrated gasication combined cycles

for sugarcane mills
Luiz Felipe Pellegrini a, *, Silvio de Oliveira Junior b, Juan Carlos Burbano a
a
ria, CEP: 05508-900,
o Paulo, Av. Prof. Luciano Gualberto, 1289 Cidade Universita
Laboratory of Environmental and Thermal Engineering, Polytechnic School University of Sa
o Paulo, SP, Brazil
Sa
b
Mechanical Engineering Faculty, Technological University of Pereira, Pereira, Colombia

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

Article history:
Received 8 December 2008
Received in revised form
31 March 2009
Accepted 9 June 2009
Available online 17 July 2009

Back in 1970s and 1980s, cogeneration plants in sugarcane mills were primarily designed to consume all
bagasse, and produce steam and electricity to the process. The plants used medium pressure steam
boilers (21 bar and 300  C) and backpressure steam turbines. Some plants needed also an additional fuel,
as the boilers were very inefcient. In those times, sugarcane bagasse did not have an economic value,
and it was considered a problem by most mills. During the 1990s and the beginning of the 2000s,
sugarcane industry faced an open market perspective, thus, there was a great necessity to reduce costs in
the production processes. In addition, the economic value of by-products (bagasse, molasses, etc.)
increased, and there was a possibility of selling electricity to the grid. This new scenario led to a search
for more advanced cogeneration systems, based mainly on higher steam parameters (4080 bar and
400500  C). In the future, some authors suggest that biomass integrated gasication combined cycles
are the best alternative to cogeneration plants in sugarcane mills. These systems might attain 3540%
efciency for the power conversion. However, supercritical steam cycles might also attain these efciency values, what makes them an alternative to gasication-based systems. This paper presents
a comparative thermoeconomic study of these systems for sugarcane mills. The congurations studied
are based on real systems that could be adapted to biomass use. Different steam consumptions in the
process are considered, in order to better integrate these congurations in the mill.
2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Cogeneration
Sugarcane mills
Gasication
Supercritical cycles
Exergy analysis

1. Introduction
Almost 45% of the Brazilian energy supply comes from renewable energy sources, while the electricity matrix is composed by
nearly 80% of renewables resources. Sugarcane products play an
important role in the Brazilian energy matrix (15%), mainly in
transportation due to the use of ethanol as fuel. However, the
participation of sugarcane and other biomasses in the electricity
matrix is still marginal, less than 4% [1]. According to EPE [2], in the
last energy public sale, a supply of 2.379 MW was contracted from
biomass, mainly from sugarcane bagasse (2% of the Brazilian
installed capacity [1]).
Back in 1970s and 1980s, cogeneration plants in sugarcane mills
were primarily designed to consume all bagasse, and produce steam
and electricity to the process. The plants used medium pressure
steam boilers (21 bar and 300  C) and backpressure steam turbines.

* Corresponding author. Tel.: 55 11 3091 9668; fax: 55 11 3091 9681.

E-mail address: luiz.pellegrini@usp.br (L.F. Pellegrini).
0360-5442/$ see front matter 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.energy.2009.06.011

Some plants needed also an additional fuel, as the boilers were very
inefcient. In those times, sugarcane bagasse did not have an
economic value, and it was considered a problem by most mills.
During the 1990s and the beginning of the 2000s, sugarcane
industry faced an open market perspective, thus, there was a great
necessity to reduce costs in the production processes. In addition,
the economic value of by-products (bagasse, molasses, etc.)
increased, and there was a possibility of selling electricity to the grid.
Today, most bagasse-red boilers still raise steam to 300  C and
21 bar that is used in backpressure turbines, responsible for the
electromechanical demands of the mill. Backpressure steam (2.5
bar) is used to fulll the thermal requirements of the process, and
its condensate is returned to the boiler. Normally, the electromechanical energy produced is for internal use only. However, some
mills already use steam with higher parameters (4266 bar),
generating an excess of electricity that is sold to the grid. Also, there
is a tendency in the sector to replace old boilers by new ones with
greater capacity (100 bar, for instance).
In the future, some authors suggest that biomass integrated
gasication combined cycles (BIGCC) are the best alternative to

L.F. Pellegrini et al. / Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

cogeneration plants in sugarcane mills. These systems might attain

3540% efciency for the conversion of power [39].
Supercritical steam cycles (SuSC) might also attain these efciency values, what makes them an alternative to gasicationbased systems [10]. Different works discuss the use of supercritical
power plants as an alternative to integrated gasication combined
cycles [11].
Using the methodology developed in a previous work [12], this
paper presents an exergetic comparative study of these systems for
sugarcane mills, using exergy-based costs to evaluate the impact of
these technologies on the production of sugar, ethanol and electricity. The congurations studied are based on real systems that
could be adapted to biomass use.
2. Technological aspects
2.1. Supercritical steam cycles (SuSC)
According to [10], supercritical plants have been in use since the
1930s, mainly in Europe. In the US, supercritical plants were rst
developed in the 1950s and 1960s. The rst units, however, experienced problems related to reliability and operational exibility
and subcritical pressure units became the US norm. Despite that,
development continued overseas and there is now little differences
in reliability between subcritical versus supercritical units [13].
Improvements in materials, and the increasing demand for high
efciency power generation units are making supercritical the
choice for new coal-red utility plant world wide [10].
In the early 1990s, the Japanese were the rst to put a supercritical plant operating with temperatures near 600  C [14,15]. By
the late 1990s, the ultrasupercritical (USC) concept was introduced,
and steam parameters raised to 290 bar range and temperatures
around 600  C. Bugge et al. [15] present data for different ultrasupercritical steam plants in service or under construction, called
by the authors 600  C power plants. The efciencies reported vary
from 40% to almost 50% (LHV) for a single re-heat (580  C/600  C)
300 bar plant, located in Denmark.
A 700  C steam power plant will be constructed during the
next 710 years constituting a benchmark for a 50% efciency (LHV)

1173

coal-red power plant [10]. The technical realization of a 700  C

steam power plant depends on a successful development and
qualication of advanced ferritic, austenitic and Ni-based alloys
[15].
Besides materials which admit higher temperatures and pressures for the steam, another important feature related to supercritical plants is the use of regenerative heat exchangers and
re-heat schemes in the boiler. These characteristics allow higher
thermal efciencies of the cycle when compared to conventional
steam cycles [16].
Regarding the use of biomass as fuel for supercritical plants, the
applicability should be evaluated based on the availability of the
biomass, its composition and combustion characteristics. As far as
combustion of biomass is concerned, the use of CFB boilers seems
to be the best possibility due to its exibility in relation to low grade
fuels. Also, considering the use of such plants for cogeneration, the
number of regenerative heat exchangers must be set in a way that
the steam needed in the process is not jeopardized.
This paper presents a supercritical steam cycle compromised by
a single re-heat boiler and six regenerative heat exchangers plus
a deaerator (Fig. 1). The pressure at each regenerative heat exchanger
was chosen based on [14]. Fig. 2 presents the Ts diagram of the SuSC.

2.2. Biomass integrated gasication combined cycles

The biomass integrated gasication combined cycle (BIGCC)
technology was rst identied over a decade ago as an advanced
technology with the potential to be cost-competitive with
conventional condensingextraction steam turbine (CEST) technology using biomass by-products of sugarcane processing as fuel,
while dramatically increasing the electricity generated per unit of
sugarcane processed [7].
Over the last 15 years, many different works arise that dealt
with the different aspects regarding the applicability of BIGCC
systems to sugarcane mills [39]. Other works discussed the
combined use of biomass derived gas and natural-gas in cogeneration plants in order to overcome some difculties related to
BIGCC plants [1719].

Fig. 1. Schematic representation of the SuSC.

1174

L.F. Pellegrini et al. / Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

700
300 bar 90 bar

2,5 bar 0,1 bar

Temperature (C)

600
500
400
300

U Maximum evaporation in multiple-effect evaporators,

increasing the solid content of the syrup;
U Increase the number of evaporator effect;
U Juice heating using vapours from all effects of the evaporator,
avoiding losses in the condenser;
U Use of liquid/liquid heaters as a rst stage in juice heating;
U Increase the pressure in each effect of the evaporator, as to make
better use of extracted vapours.

200
100
0.2
0

0.4
3

0.6
5

0.8
6

10

11

Entropy (kJ/kg-K)
Fig. 2. Ts diagram for the SuSC system.

Consonni and Larson [20] described and analyzed the main

designs available for gasiers to be applied in BIGCC plants: low
pressure air-blown, low pressure indirect heated and high pressure
air-blown. Some of the key tradeoffs involved in designing and
commercializing BIGCC systems relate to Atmospheric versus
Pressurized gasication, hot versus cold Atmospheric cleanup, the
adaptability of commercial gas turbines, and the thermal integration between the dryer, the gas production equipment, and the
turbomachinery.
Pressurized gasication provides a thermodynamic advantage
(it avoids thermodynamic losses associated with compressing the
fuel gas), but presents greater technological development challenges. With directly heated (air-blown) gasication, some minor
modications are required to use existing aeroderivative turbines,
including de-rating the ring temperature. Indirectly heated gasication produces a fuel gas with higher energy content so that
natural-gas ring temperatures can be readily achieved with
existing machines [20].
This paper presents three congurations for BIGCC technology:
two low pressure air-blown and one high pressure air-blown. For
low pressure air-blown congurations (Fig. 3), the off-design
operation strategy adopted was de-rating the ring temperature in
the turbine. For the high pressure air-blown gasier (Fig. 4), the
compressor blast-off was used, with the air extracted being sent to
the gasier.
2.3. Steam consumption for sugar and ethanol production
Different authors have shown that the integration of BIGCC
systems to sugarcane mills is only possible if there is a considerable
reduction in the steam consumption in the processes [3,6,7,9]. Also,
in order to avoid an excessive use of biomass in supercritical boilers,
it is very important to set up a regenerative heat exchanger
network to increase the inlet water temperature in the boiler.
Hence, a reduction in the steam consumption in the process will
make it possible to extract steam from turbine to these heat
exchangers.
Current sugarcane mills do not show a high level of thermal
integration among its heating and cooling demands, presenting
higher steam consumptions when compared to beet sugar mills or
corn ethanol distilleries [2123]. Furthermore, the internal steam
consumption and the level of thermal integration are inuenced by
the production strategy adopted (amount of cane crushed for sugar
and ethanol).
It is well-known that reducing the process steam requirements
lead to higher surplus of electricity inside sugarcane mills [12,23].
Avram and Stark [24], and Rein [25] present some opportunities
to reduce the steam consumption in sugarcane mills:

As for the distillery, Seemann [26] discusses the use of multipressure distillation in order to decrease the steam consumption.
A new proposal for multi-pressure systems is the Split Feed
developed by Dedini-Agro with support of Siemens and
Chemtech. This system uses three columns operating with
different pressure levels, and promotes a thermal integration
between columns. This paper considers the use of two columns
operating under different pressure levels, leading to different
temperatures in re-boilers and condensers, that allows integrating
the re-boilers and condensers of columns and decreasing the
thermal steam demand to distillation system. Such integration
leads to a steam consumption of 1.6 kg/L [27].
In this paper, a base case for a conventional sugarcane mills has
been set with following characteristics:
U Production strategy: 50% for sugar, 50% for ethanol;
U Low level of thermal integration: extraction from the rst effect
of the multiple-effect for heating juice from the milling and
vacuum pans. Backpressure steam used in the multiple-effect
and distillery;
U Cogeneration plant with bagasse-red boilers (82%, LHV efciency) with steam generated at 21 bar and 300  C, and low
efciency (5565%) backpressure steam turbines.
The modications cited were implemented to reduce the steam
consumption and integrate the SuSC and BIGCC systems into the mill.

3. Modeling approach and simulation

3.1. Sugar and ethanol production
The model developed in [12] for the evaluation of the joint
production of sugar, ethanol and electricity was used to simulate
the congurations. The model is composed of mass, energy, exergy
and cost balances for each component of the system, as well as by
relations to determine the liquidvapour equilibrium in the
multiple-effect evaporator and vacuum pans. The model assess all
major processes involved in the production of sugar and ethanol
(extraction system, juice treatment plant pH correction and
heating, evaporation, cooking, fermentation and distillation), as
well as the re-use of part of the condensate generated by the use of
vegetable steam as imbibition in the extraction system and dilution
water in the ethanol process.
The production of sugar is calculated using data for solid and
sucrose concentration on the syrup leaving the multiple-effect
evaporator and the different ows of the cooking process (vacuum
pans). The steam consumption is determined by energy balances in
each equipment.
The amount of ethanol produced is based on the stoichiometric
conversion of sugars into ethanol (0.511 L of ethanol/kg of sugars,
considering an 89% efciency for the fermentation process and 99%
for the distillation process. Furthermore, steam consumption for
the distillation process is calculated based on 3.5 kg of low pressure
steam (2.5 bar)/L of ethanol for the conventional mill, and 1.6 kg of
low pressure steam/L of ethanol for multi-pressure distillation [26].

L.F. Pellegrini et al. / Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

1175

Fig. 3. Schematic representation of the Atmospheric BIGCC.

3.2. Bagasse drying

3.4. Gas turbine

The model is based on [28], which considers an energy balance

in the dryer and that the outlet air is saturated. It is assumed that
the thermal loss is equivalent to 1% of the enthalpy variation of the
hot gases used for drying.
For the SuSC system, the exhaust gases from the boiler are used
to dry bagasse up to 40% moisture content. As for the BIGCC
systems, it is possible to dry bagasse to 10% moisture content, since
the amount of exhaust gases from the heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) is higher than that of the SuSC boiler.

For the gas turbine simulation red with produced gas, two
approaches were considered [19,29]:

3.3. Gasication
A chemical equilibrium model was considered as developed in
[9]. The model allows the evaluation of the composition of the
produced gas, under different pressures and temperatures, as well
as for different compositions of the biomass. Table 1 presents the
composition of the produced gas generated in both low pressure
and high pressure air-blown gasiers evaluated in this paper. For
both cases, it was considered an equivalence ratio of 0.3 and that
all bagasse is converted into produced gas (no charcoal
production).
Comparison between the values in Table 1 and those obtained in
real systems might be found in [9].

U De-rating for the low pressure air-blown gasication (turbine

inlet temperature (TIT) decrease, with the air mass owrate
constant in the compressor);
U Compressor blast-off for the high pressure air-blown gasication (same TIT as the design point, extracting the excess air from
the compressor before the combustion chamber).
The design conditions were dened based on ALSTOM GT-11
operating under ISO conditions, and these parameters were used in
the off-design simulation.
3.5. Other equipment
Table 2 shows other assumptions made in the simulation.
It was also considered the total electrication of mechanical
drives with motors with 95% efciency.
3.6. Simulation
The models presented above were implemented in the Engineering Equation Solver (EES) [30], and simulated considering

1176

L.F. Pellegrini et al. / Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

Fig. 4. Schematic representation of the Pressurized BIGCC.

a steady-state operation, with approximately 50% of the cane

crushed to sugar production and 50% to hydrated alcohol production. EES has been previously used to evaluate the performance of
different bagasse boiler congurations [28], to simulate the process
steam demand reduction in sugarcane mills [23]. Furthermore, it is
possible to nd in the literature the use of EES to evaluate different
energy conversion systems.
As for the criterion used to distribute costs among different
products in a given control volume, it was considered that each
product has the same importance. Thus, their exergy-based costs
were set equal. This criterion is similar to the equality method
discussed in [31]. This means that the cost associated to the irreversibilities in the control volume is distributed equally among the

Table 1
Produced gas composition for the two congurations of gasier (low and pressure
air-blown).
Component

CH4
CO
H2
CO2
H2O
N2
Ar
LHV (kJ/kg)

Molar fraction (%)

Low pressure air-blown

High pressure air-blown

0.2
23.2
22.9
10.3
5.6
37.4
0.5
5137

0.8
23.0
20.2
9.5
9.2
37.0
0.4
5939

exergy content of the outlet product ows. Furthermore, it was

attributed zero cost to all ows leaving the mill control volume
without further use (excess bagasse, stack gases, contaminated
condensate, for instance).
The idea of using cost balances is to show the cost formation
process inside the mill and to evaluate the impact of improving the
cogeneration exergy efciency on the cost formation process. The
same methodology was used to assess different congurations for
cogeneration systems in sugarcane mills based on conventional
steam turbines [12].
3.7. Error analysis
The model developed is based on the real operation of sugarcane mills installed in Brazil. The following variables were
measured during a eld research performed during harvests of
2005 and 2006 (a table with the values of these data is presented in
Appendix I):
U
U
U
U
U
U
U
U

Sugarcane composition
Fiber composition
Bagasse moisture
Pressure in each effect of the multiple-effect evaporator
Pressure in the vacuum pans
Solid and sucrose contents in the ltered juice
Solid and sucrose contents in the syrup before vacuum pans
Solid and sucrose contents in the mass after vacuum pans

L.F. Pellegrini et al. / Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

4. Results

Table 2
General parameters used for the simulated cogeneration systems.
Parameter

Value

Conventional mill
Boiler efciency (%, LHV basis)
Power turbine isentropic efciency (%)
Electric generator efciency (%)
Mechanical drive turbine isentropic efciency (%)
Pump isentropic efciency (%)

82
65
95
55
70

SuSC
Steam pressure (bar)
Steam temperature ( C)
Re-heat steam temperature ( C)
Boiler efciency (%, LHV basis)
Turbine stages isentropic efciency (%)
Electric generator efciency (%)
Pump isentropic efciency (%)

292
590
590
87
6585
95
70

BIGCC
Steam pressure (bar)
Steam temperature ( C)
Produced gas compressor isentropic efciency (%)
HRSG pinch point ( C)
HRSG approach point ( C)
Turbine (condensingextraction) isentropic efciency (%)
Electric generator efciency (%)
Pump isentropic efciency (%)

4080
400510
80
10
5
7580
95
70

U Sugar and molasses Purity

U Steam consumption in the distillery
Except for pressure measurements and the steam consumption
in the distillery, all other data were obtained through laboratorial
analysis with high levels of accuracy. Pressure data were taken from
gauge manometers installed in each equipment, and the steam
consumption in the distillery was obtained through the use of
owmeters for steam and ethanol.
These data were used to develop mass and energy balances
responsible for the calculation of steam and electromechanical
energy demands in process, which are needed to determine the
electricity output in the cogeneration plant. Data for the cogeneration systems studied were imposed by the authors.
All simulations were performed using the EES software with
a convergence criterion of 109.
The error analysis was developed using the EES software, and
uncertainties for steam and electromechanical energy demands,
exergy-based costs for sugar and ethanol are given in Table 3.
As can be seen in Table 3, the most sensitive variable to errors in
measured data is the specic steam consumption, which is very
dependent on the steam consumption in the distillery, and also in
the sugar production process, specially in the vacuum pans. On the
other hand, the sensitiveness of the exergy-based cost of the
products is more dependent on the composition of the sugarcane
that determines the amount of sugar and ethanol to be produced.
Further analysis were developed considering modications in
both production processes and in the cogeneration plant, based on
concepts to minimize the exergy destruction in energy conversion
processes.
Table 3
Uncertainty evaluation.
Variable

Calculated
value

Uncertainty

Relative
error

Specic steam consumption (kg/tc)

Electromechanical energy consumption
(kWh/tc)
Sugar exergy-based cost (kJ/kJ)
Ethanol exergy-based cost (kJ/kJ)

490.4
30.00

9.7
0.12

2.0%
0.4%

0.017
0.021

0.9%
0.6%

1.923
3.651

1177

4.1. Steam reduction

The simulation of the traditional mill resulted in a process steam
consumption of 492 kg/tc (tc tons of cane crushed). Analysing the
results it is possible to come upon ways of decrease this
consumption, as discussed in Section 2.3.
U
U
U
U

80 kg/tc of vapour are condensed in the barometric condenser.

175 kg/tc of condensate at 90  C are cooled in spray coolers.
60% of solid content in the syrup (maximum solubility is 75%).
Only vapour from the rst effect is used to heat the juice.

In order to reduce the process steam consumption the following

measures were adopted:
U Increase the pressure in each effect of the multiple-effect;
U Vapour extraction from all effects, with no losses to the
condenser, achieving 72% solid content;
U 3rd effect vapour is used in the vacuum pans;
U Use of liquid/liquid heat exchangers for juice heating;
U Use of a multi-pressure distillation process, consuming 1.6 kg of
steam/L of hydrated alcohol [26].
U Stillage is used to heat fermented liquor before the distillation
process.
These modications resulted in a decrease of 43% in the process
steam consumption (280 kg/tc).
Considering the exergy destruction in the sugar and ethanol
processes, including the extraction system, there has been
a decrease of approximately 15% (from 259 kWh/tc to 220 kWh/tc).
It is important to notice that these processes account for nearly 30%
of the total exergy destruction inside the mill [12].
The cogeneration plant accounts for 613 kWh/tc of exergy
destruction in traditional mills, including the amount of excess
bagasse not used to generate power.
4.2. SuSC
Table 4 presents values for specic mass owrate, temperature
and pressure for each ow indicated in Fig. 1. The supercritical
steam cycle is capable of generating an excess electricity of
142 kWh/tc, reducing the exergy destruction inside the mill by
nearly 12% (see Fig. 5). The exergy-based cost of the electricity is
reduced by 49%, while the sugar and ethanol exergy-based costs are
decreased by 28% and 30%, respectively (see Fig. 6).
4.3. BIGCC
Three congurations were simulated for BIGCC systems, and
values for specic mass owrate, temperature and pressure for
each ow are shown in Tables 57:
i. Atmospheric BIGCC, with steam generation at 40 bar and
400  C (Table 5);
ii. Atmospheric BIGCC, with steam generation at 80 bar and
510  C (Table 6);
iii. Pressurized BIGCC, with steam generation at 80 bar and
510  C (Table 7).
These congurations are based on the ones proposed in [20],
with heat recovery from the cleaning station to steam production
as well as pre-heating air before the gasier in the case of Atmospheric gasication. As for the Atmospheric gasication with steam

L.F. Pellegrini et al. / Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

Table 4
Calculated values for specic mass owrate, temperature and pressure for the SuSC
conguration.
Tag

Mass owrate (kg/tc)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35

668
45
551
72
551
17
52
477
16
9
260
17
176
217
198
18
198
198
198
668
668
668
668
668
45
116
133
16
24
41
278
264
264
7
21

Temperature ( C)
600.0
402.5
356.5
356.5
600.0
495.4
422.7
422.7
333.1
227.7
227.7
159.9
45.8
45.8
46.0
46.0
97.6
125.4
169.4
206.0
213.2
235.0
278.9
303.0
301.0
277.9
235.0
170.4
127.4
99.6
140.0
120.0
120.3
422.7
70.0

Pressure (bar)
300.0
87.1
62.2
62.2
62.2
30.6
17.6
17.6
8.0
2.5
2.5
1.0
0.1
0.1
17.6
17.6
17.6
17.6
17.6
17.6
300.0
300.0
300.0
300.0
87.1
62.2
30.6
8.0
2.5
1.0
2.5
2.5
17.6
17.6
17.6

generation at 80 bar and 510  C, the HRSG produces saturated

steam at 80 bar which is superheated by cooling produced gas from
the gasier.
For the rst case, the amount of excess electricity generated is
152 kWh/tc (Fig. 5), with a decrease in the exergy destruction
inside the mill of 15%, in comparison to the traditional mill. The
exergy-based cost of the electricity is reduced by 55%, while the
sugar and ethanol exergy-based costs are decreased by 28% and
31%, respectively (Fig. 6).
As for the second case, there has been an increase in the excess
electricity generation to 155 kWh/tc, decreasing the total exergy
destruction by 16% (Fig. 5). The exergy-based cost of the products is
slightly lower than those for the rst case. These results show that

1200
1000

kWh/tc

800

Traditional Mill
Atmospheric BIGCC (40 bar)
Atmospheric BIGCC (80 bar)
Pressurized BIGCC (80 bar)
SuSC

600
400
200
0
Excess Electricity Generation

Exergy Destruction

Fig. 5. Excess electricity generation and exergy destruction for the different systems.

Exergy-based Cost (kJ/kJ)

1178

7.50
7.00
6.50
6.00
5.50
5.00
4.50
4.00
3.50
3.00
2.50
2.00
1.50
1.00
0.50
0.00

Traditional Mill
Atmospheric BIGCC (40 bar)
Atmospheric BIGCC (80 bar)
Pressurized BIGCC (80 bar)
SuSC

Electricity

Process Steam

Sugar

Ethanol

Fig. 6. Exergy-based costs of electricity, process steam, sugar and ethanol for the
different systems.

the heat released during cleaning of the produced gas is better used
to superheat steam rather than evaporate other, since it allows the
use of higher steam pressures and temperatures in the steam cycle.
The net effect is 3 kWh/tc of additional electricity and a reduction of
11 kWh/tc in the irreversibilities (Fig. 5).
The last conguration for BIGCC systems is the most efcient
one, generating almost 202 kWh/tc of excess electricity, while
reducing the exergy destruction by nearly 20% (Fig. 5). Also, the
exergy-based cost of sugar and ethanol are 32% and 34% lower than
that of the traditional conguration (Fig. 6). The absence of the
produced gas compressor is the main reason for the increase in the
electricity generation and the consequent better thermodynamic
performance of the mill. This compressor accounts for 54 kWh/tc
(almost 20% of total generation) of electricity in Atmospheric
BIGCCs, increasing the cost of the produced gas to the combustion
chamber, and, hence, of all downstream ows. Such increase of
costs leads to higher costs for sugar and ethanol as presented

Table 5
Calculated values for specic mass owrate, temperature and pressure for the
Atmospheric BIGCC, with steam generation at 40 bar and 400  C.
Tag

Mass owrate (kg/tc)

Temperature ( C)

Pressure (bar)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26

212
212
212
355
355
355
348
7
348
2519
2519
2868
2868
2868
372
11
2
277
263
79
79
79
374
372
8
22

25.0
103.6
300.0
761.4
350.0
258.0
35.0
35.0
447.8
25.0
451.9
995.0
457.8
188.8
420.0
146.4
121.2
140.0
125.0
45.8
45.8
45.8
120.4
121.2
420.0
70.0

1.0
2.0
2.0
2.0
2.0
2.0
1.0
1.0
15.7
1.0
15.7
15.2
1.1
1.1
40.0
2.5
41.1
2.5
2.5
0.1
0.1
2.5
2.5
41.1
40.0
2.5

L.F. Pellegrini et al. / Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

Table 6
Calculated values for specic mass owrate, temperature and pressure for the
Atmospheric BIGCC, with steam generation at 80 bar and 510  C.
Tag

Mass owrate (kg/tc)

Temperature ( C)

Pressure (bar)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26

212
212
212
355
355
355
349
6
349
2516
2516
2864
2864
2864
326
7
2
277
263
38
38
38
326
326
6
20

25.0
103.6
261.2
751.0
311.2
237.2
35.0
35.0
447.2
25.0
451.9
994.6
457.6
218.3
510.0
149.3
121.9
140.0
120.0
45.8
45.8
45.8
120.4
121.9
510.0
70.0

1.0
2.0
2.0
2.0
2.0
2.0
1.0
1.0
15.7
1.0
15.7
15.2
1.1
1.1
80.0
2.5
81.1
2.5
2.5
0.1
0.1
2.5
2.5
81.1
80.0
2.5

previously. Furthermore, for Pressurized BIGCC, less exergy is

destroyed in the cleaning process due to the hot cleanup.

4.4. Comparative analysis

There is an increase of 7% and 9% in the electricity generation for
Atmospheric BIGCC (40 bar) and Atmospheric BIGCC (80 bar),
respectively, in relation to SuSC systems. However, it is interesting
to notice that the impact of SuSC on the exergy-based cost of sugar
and ethanol is almost the same as that of the Atmospheric BIGCCs.
This is a consequence of the higher exergy-based cost of process
steam for the later, which is connected to higher exergy destruction

Table 7
Calculated values for specic mass owrate, temperature and pressure for the
Pressurized BIGCC, with steam generation at 80 bar and 510  C.
Tag

Mass owrate (kg/tc)

Temperature ( C)

Pressure (bar)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21

212
355
355
2251
2251
61
2333
2333
2333
362
12
2
277
263
70
70
70
362
362
6
20

451.9
857.6
550.0
25.0
451.9
451.9
1119.0
541.6
185.7
510.0
149.3
120.0
140.0
120.0
45.8
45.8
45.8
120.4
120.0
510.0
70.0

15.7
15.7
15.7
1.0
15.7
15.7
15.2
1.1
1.1
80.0
2.5
81.1
2.5
2.5
0.1
0.1
2.5
2.5
81.1
80.0
2.5

1179

in equipment upstream to the steam generation in Atmospheric

BIGCCs, while the electricity exergy-based cost of SuSC is greater
than those of Atmospheric BIGCCs. Hence, the net effect is that
these systems have the same impact on the exergy-based cost of
sugar and ethanol. This indicates the low efciency of the steam
cycle of the Atmospheric BIGCCs when compared to SuSC system,
and also the negative impact of the use of a produced gas
compressor, since Pressurized BIGCC has the lowest exergy-based
cost for every exergy ow in the mill.

5. Conclusions
The congurations presented in this paper, which might be
called advanced cogeneration systems, allow the generation of
roughly three times more excess electricity when compared to
current available condensingextraction steam turbines schemes
[12]. Pressurized gasication allows even higher excess electricity
outputs, achieving 202 kWh/tc. However, there is a need to
decrease the process steam consumption to values lower than
350 kg/tc.
The thermal integration proposed in this paper reduced the
steam consumption by 43%, to 280 kg/tc, representing 15% of
exergy destruction savings inside the mill.
As a consequence of the high exergy destruction in equipment
upstream to the steam generation in the Atmospheric BIGCC
systems, when compared to SuSC, those systems present higher
exergy-based costs of process steam. However, as for Pressurized
BIGCC, the exergy destruction is lower than for SuSC, thus the
process steam exergy-based cost for this conguration is the lowest
one. Also, it is important to comment on the low efciency of the
steam cycles of BIGCC when compared to SuSC conguration.
Although, SuSC are not competitive with Pressurized BIGCC as
far as electricity generation is concerned, the technology to
implement SuSC plants in sugarcane mills seems to be closer to
commercial scale than BIGCC one. However, SuSC systems are not
suitable for small installed capacities, due to problems related to
the operation of the rst stages of the turbine with small mass
ows (reduced volumetric ow) requiring very small blades, with
inefcient design related to leakage between stages. The smaller
plants for SuSC would have a generating capacity of 280 MW,
leading to mills crushing at least 6.5 million tons per year (in Brazil,
in the last harvest, only two mills crushed more 6 million tons [32]).
The realization of SuSC plants might be feasible for centralized
plants to be construct near a pool of mills, instead of inside a mill.
For instance, to run 280 MW plant based on bagasse during 6000 h
(70% of availability), it would be needed something like 2.5 millions
of tons of bagasse. On the one hand, this leads to a problem: where
to nd this excess bagasse in economic range from the thermoelectric plant (50 km). On the other hand, the use of sugarcane trash
might turn it feasible due to the high amount of its availability if
mechanized harvest is used.
Furthermore, if all mills could install Pressurized BIGCCs
systems in their cogeneration facilities then the total amount of
electricity generated (115 TWh/year) would represent 25% of the
Brazilian total generation.

Acknowledgement
The authors wish to acknowledge Fundaao de Amparo a` Pesquisa do Estado de Sao Paulo (FAPESP) and Conselho Nacional de
Pesquisa (CNPq) for the nancial support received (grants 03/
12094-8 and 301115/2006-0, respectively), and Usina Iracema for
their technical support and data.

1180

L.F. Pellegrini et al. / Energy 35 (2010) 11721180

Appendix I
Table A1 presents data measured in a sugarcane mill and used to
develop the mass and energy balances for sugar and ethanol
production processes.
Table A1
Measured data.
Variable

Measure
(kg/kg)

Uncertainty
(kg/kg)

Relative
error

Sugarcane total sugars

Syrup solid content
Mass A solid content
Sugar solid content
Honey solid content
Mass B solid content
Molasses solid content
Magma solid content
Sugarcane dissolved solids
Sugarcane ber content
Ash mass fraction in ber
Carbon mass fraction in ber
Hydrogen mass fraction in ber
Oxygen mass fraction in ber
Bagasse moisture
First effect pressure
Second effect pressure
Third effect pressure
Fourth effect pressure
Fifth effect pressure
Vacuum pans pressure
Mass A sucrose content
Sugar sucrose content
Honey sucrose content
Mass B sucrose content
Molasses sucrose content
Magma sucrose content
Sugarcane sucrose content
Specic steam consumption
in the distillery (kg/L)

0.155
0.600
0.928
0.999
0.678
0.936
0.767
0.903
0.160
0.125
0.010
0.467
0.058
0.465
0.500
1.80
1.34
0.94
0.56
0.20
0.20
0.799
0.998
0.537
0.749
0.489
0.829
0.137
3.5

0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.020
0.02
0.01
0.01
0.01
0.00
0.00
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.001
0.2

0.6%
0.2%
0.1%
0.1%
0.1%
0.1%
0.1%
0.1%
0.6%
0.8%
10.0%
0.2%
1.7%
0.2%
4.0%
1.0%
1.0%
1.0%
1.0%
1.0%
1.0%
0.1%
0.1%
0.2%
0.1%
0.2%
0.1%
0.7%
5.7%

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