Techno Economic and Life-Cycle Analysis of Ammonia Used for Power Generation
Name
energies-19-04415.pdf
Size
2.33 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
017a6d69438caca3ad2771e366f2ef73
Author(s)
Zhang, Jianan
Bhat, Maanasa
Zhao, Yan
Date Issued
September 18, 2026
Journal
Energies
Publisher
Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute
Citation
Zhang, J.; Bhat, M.; Zhao, Y. Techno Economic and Life-Cycle Analysis of Ammonia Used for Power Generation. Energies 2026, 19, 4415.
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Ammonia is a promising carbon-free energy carrier for decarbonizing existing fossil fuel power plants. However, its economic viability and life-cycle environmental performance remain uncertain across different power generation technologies. This study develops an integrated techno-economic analysis (TEA) and life-cycle analysis (LCA) framework to evaluate 50% ammonia co-firing in four power generation systems: subcritical pulverized coal (SubC-CP), supercritical pulverized coal (SC-CP), integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC), and natural gas combined cycle (NGCC). Process models modified from National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) simulations were used to determine mass and energy balances, while TEA quantified total plant cost, levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), breakeven ammonia price, and CO2 avoidance cost (CAC). LCA evaluated well-to-gate (WTG) CO2 emissions considering both blue and green ammonia. Results show that under the current blue ammonia price of $318/tonne, all ammonia co-firing cases exhibit higher LCOEs than the reference plants, and the breakeven ammonia prices remain below current market values. Blue ammonia reduces WTG CO2 emissions by approximately 30% for coal-fired plants and 19% for NGCC where upstream ammonia production is the major emission source. Replacing blue ammonia with green ammonia further reduces WTG CO2 emissions by 27–36% and decreases the CAC by 38–60%. These results demonstrate that low-carbon, low-cost ammonia production is essential for realizing economically competitive and environmentally sustainable ammonia co-firing in future low-carbon power systems.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.3390/en19184415
