Ideal EROI (energy return on investment) deepens the understanding of energy systems

Reynir Atlason and Runar Unnthorsson

Energy, 2014, vol. 67, issue C, 241-245

Abstract: This article presents a new EROI (energy return on investment) factor named the ideal EROI, or EROIide, that provides the theoretical upper boundary of the EROI of a given system. The EROIide is the ratio between the inputs within the EROIstnd boundaries and the theoretical maximum output from a given system; i.e, all losses are omitted and the maximum theoretical energy output of the system is used. EROIide resembles the concept of the idealised Carnot heat engine. Although the EROI of a given system can never be equal to EROIide, the EROIide can be used to estimate the potential for improvement; e.g., if the difference between the EROIide and EROIstnd is small then little improvement can be expected from further research funding. Calculations using EROIide can add a valuable depth to the overall results of an EROI study, benefitting policy makers involved in energy policy planning. Three application examples of EROIide are provided, one for a hydroelectric power plant, one for a geothermal power plant and one example for a hypothetical wind farm. The calculations show that the hydro power plant could improve approximately 3 fold, whereas the geothermal plant had a potential of 27 fold improvement over its lifetime.

Keywords: Geothermal; Hydro; Wind; Energy return on investment; Ideal; Energy production (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544214001182
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:67:y:2014:i:c:p:241-245

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2014.01.096

Access Statistics for this article

Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser

More articles in Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().