Greenhouse gas mitigation potential through clean energy for cement production in India

A preliminary approach has been made to assess the concentrated solar energy applications in cement production as well as greenhouse gas mitigation potential. The work starts with identification of processes that utilizes thermal energy in cement production. Then cluster of cement plants located at different locations of the country has been made. Also, the availability of solar radiation and wind speed at each plant location have been identified. Subsequently, the solar industrial process heating system have been developed for different locations in the country. Further, solar reactor output, number of heliostats, total land area and mirror surface have been estimated. All these estimations are done by considering three types of thermal losses in solar reactor i.e. 15, 30 and 45 percent respectively. Solar energy can provide a total of 738.11 PJ of thermal energy, which is needed to fulfil the process heating requirement of the calcination process for the manufacturing of cement in India. Solar industrial process heating system for cement production in India can reduce yearly CO2 emissions by 2457-7648 thousand tonnes.