Thermoecologic Assessment and Life Cycle-Based Environmental Pollution Cost Analysis of Microgas Turbine

Increasing global warming concerns are compelling humanity to find alternative fuels to fossil fuels. Ammonia, with its carbon-free structure, can be combusted to produce only water and nitrogen. This study includes exergy analysis-based thermoecologic analysis and life cycle assessment-based environmental pollution cost analysis of a Turbec T100 microturbine. A Turbec T100 microturbine is normally operated with natural gas combustion and is modeled using commercially available software for (1) natural gas; (2) 10% ammonia and 90% natural gas; and (3) 20% ammonia and 80% natural gas mass fractions. The ecologic objective function and ecological coefficient of performance parameters for natural gas combustion are -174.441 and 0.37336, respectively. The 20% ammonia combustion has the best ecologic objective function and ecological coefficient of performance results, which are -156.818 and 0.3986, respectively. The 20% ammonia combustion also decreases the environmental and life cycle-based environmental payback period. However, 20% ammonia combustion slightly increases the payback period of the system. The 20% ammonia has the lowest CO2-equivalent emission rate due to producing the lowest CO2-equivalent emissions during combustion. Finally, 20% ammonia combustion decreases total and specific environmental pollution costs.