Mohammad Abotalib
Kuwait University Khaldiya Campus, Kuwait
Title: Environmental analysis of carbon capture and sequestration in Western Europe and North America
Biography
Biography: Mohammad Abotalib
Abstract
The energy penalties of carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) has raised the awareness of possible associated environmental impacts as a result of technology deployment at a large-scale. However, the technology is considered the future towards achieving low-carbon electricity from fossil fuel in general, and more specifically in the coal-fired power industry. Therefore, many scientists suggested using the life cycle assessment (LCA) approach as an environmental assessment tool of the technology’s environmental impacts. Most published literature on LCA of post-combustion carbon capture and sequestration CCS, represents the European and the North American scenarios. Regardless to the region considered, LCA studies agree on significant reduction in global warming potential (GWP) (70-72%) and a considerable increase in cumulative energy demand (CED) (41-49%). Nevertheless, there is a less of an agreement about the changes in eutrophication potential (EP) and acidification potential (AP). The result shows that the mean of AP is not significantly different in Western Europe and North America. On the other hand, changes in the mean of EP for coal-fired power plants in North America and Western Europe are different. In Western Europe, coal is transported over short distances leading to lower NOx emission. Furthermore, phosphorus continent in fuel was about half the amount that is found in North America, which resulted in lower phosphorus and phosphate emission (major contributors for eutrophication).