A methodology and assessment for the viability of trigeneration systems to reduce emissions

Trigeneration systems allow for an efficient way of consuming fossil fuels and therefore utilisation of such systems is amongst the adopted measures to address environmental issues. Carbon pricing was introduced in Australia in July 2012 and subsequently repealed by the newly elected government due to its questionable effectiveness. In this paper, a thermo-economic methodology was developed to attempt to provide an insight into the optimisation and economics of small and medium scale turbine-based trigeneration systems under three environmental policies through the application of two case studies. A comprehensive sensitivity analysis was performed. The results indicate that carbon pricing is a sound policy to make the installation of small scale trigeneration systems economically favourable. All medium scale trigeneration systems in the study were uneconomical, although the system was marginally (1%) more profitable under the new policy than under carbon pricing. It was also observed policy concerning feed-in tariffs should be revised.