Technologies for reducing emissions and costs in combined heat and power production

Abstract

According Finnish Energy association, in Finland roughly three-quarters of district heat production is based on combined heat and power (CHP) generation. Correspondingly, one-third of electricity is generated using CHP. In Finland, the market share of CHP derived electricity is significant, and therefore used technologies and fuels should be carefully chosen in terms of costs and emissions. In this paper we consider a case of Kuopio, which is the 9thbiggest city in Finland. In the past few years, the total usage of fossil fuels has been decreasing and the use of renewable fuels has correspondingly been increasing. The amount of electricity produced with peat has gradually decreased during the last 15 years. The common explaining factor for these trends is the political will and national and municipal level shared common aim to reduce greenhouse gases and emissions. Furthermore, there are new technical innovations available, such as flue gas scrubber and district cooling system, which has been proven to be significant tools to reduce emission and at the same time investments into these innovations have been shown to save energy and money, meaning being greener has been also financially lucrative decision for these sustainability enhancing technology investors.