Analysis of the Ca-looping sorption-enhanced steam reforming and solid oxide fuel cell integrated process using bio-oil

Solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) is a powerful technology for heat and power generation that can be combined with many applications. This study presents a thermodynamic analysis of the Ca-looping sorption enhanced steam reforming (SESR) of bio-oil integrated with an SOFC. Acetic acid is used as a model compound to represent a bio-oil aqueous fraction. Useful heat from an SOFC is utilized in the regenerator to improve the performance of the SOFC system. The effects of key parameters in operating the Ca-looping sorption-enhanced steam reformer and SOFC are discussed. The results indicate that Ca-looping SESR integrated with SOFC has a higher performance than the conventional process. Increasing the SESR temperature, the CaO/fuel ratio, the SOFC temperature, and the fuel utilization increases the electrical efficiency, but it decreases with S/F ratio. Regarding an energy analysis, the regenerator requires higher energy when it operates at a high steam and CaO/fuel ratio but lower energy when it operates at high SESR temperatures. In addition, the system efficiency of the SOFC integrated process decreases with SESR temperature and steam due to the high amount of energy to feed and air preheating. Heat integration using the pinch analysis method to certify the maximum heat recovery improves the system efficiency. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.