Improving the Environmental Sustainability of Flash Geothermal Power Plants—A Case Study

Lorenzo Bruscoli, Daniele Fiaschi, Giampaolo Manfrida and Duccio Tempesti
Additional contact information
Lorenzo Bruscoli: Dipartimento di Ingegneria Industriale, Università degli Studi di Firenze, Viale G.B. Morgagni 40, 50134 Firenze, Italy
Daniele Fiaschi: Dipartimento di Ingegneria Industriale, Università degli Studi di Firenze, Viale G.B. Morgagni 40, 50134 Firenze, Italy
Giampaolo Manfrida: Dipartimento di Ingegneria Industriale, Università degli Studi di Firenze, Viale G.B. Morgagni 40, 50134 Firenze, Italy
Duccio Tempesti: Dipartimento di Ingegneria Industriale, Università degli Studi di Firenze, Viale G.B. Morgagni 40, 50134 Firenze, Italy

Sustainability, 2015, vol. 7, issue 11, 1-22

Abstract: The sustainability of geothermal energy production is analyzed with reference to a production plant located in a specific area (Monte Amiata, Italy). Four solutions combining a flash power plant with an Organic Rankine Cycle in a hybrid configuration are analyzed in terms of production of electricity, exergy balance and emissions level (CO 2 , H 2 S, Hg). The different solutions correspond to increasing environmental performance, and for the most advanced case achieve near-zero emissions (complete reinjection of the natural resource, including incondensable gases). The results show that this can be achieved at the price of a progressive reduction of electrical productivity.

Keywords: geothermal energy conversion; sustainability; exergy analysis; organic rankine cycle (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/7/11/15262/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/7/11/15262/ (text/html)

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:gam:jsusta:v:7:y:2015:i:11:p:15262-15283:d:59025

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().