IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/appene/v392y2025ics0306261925007184.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The potential for electrifying industrial utility systems in existing chemical plants

Author

Listed:
  • Bielefeld, Svenja
  • Cvetković, Miloš
  • Ramírez, Andrea

Abstract

The electrification of utility systems in energy-intensive plants is a promising measure for decarbonising the chemical industry in the short term. However, with the increasing deployment of renewable energy sources, the variability of electricity prices will become a challenge for plants with continuous and constant energy demand. It is thus uncertain whether electrification can become financially viable. This work models the electrification of utility systems in combination with storage technologies for five chemical plants with existing fossil fuel-based utility generation and uses historical data as energy price scenarios. The results show that partial electrification is cost-effective when using electricity is cheaper than natural gas for more than 600 h. Regarding the portfolio of technologies, electric boilers are installed first, followed by thermal energy storage and batteries. Hydrogen is not cost-effective in any of the scenarios explored. This is independent of the type of plant, the available grid connection capacity, and the minimal load of existing fossil fuel-based utility generation. This work thus highlights the potential for electrifying industrial utility systems and the role that electric boilers and energy storage units can play in electrification.

Suggested Citation

  • Bielefeld, Svenja & Cvetković, Miloš & Ramírez, Andrea, 2025. "The potential for electrifying industrial utility systems in existing chemical plants," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 392(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:392:y:2025:i:c:s0306261925007184
    DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2025.125988
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306261925007184
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.apenergy.2025.125988?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:392:y:2025:i:c:s0306261925007184. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.