Given the increasing public concern about global warming, and the economic incentives that have been already placed by several countries, many industries are currently evaluating and implementing programs to reduce their CO2 emissions. In particular, the production of steam and power offers one of the most promising opportunities to decrease atmospheric releases of CO2.

Most petrochemical sites and power stations consume fossil fuels in order to supply valuable utilities (e.g. electricity and steam) to other process units or external consumers. The combustion gases obtained as by-product contain significant amounts of CO2 that can be separated and compressed for underground sequestration.

The CO2 capture also entails very energy-intensive processes, which can be integrated with the heat and power production to improve the overall efficiency and minimize operating costs. The present work examines different options to integrate CO2 capture technologies into a combined heat and power plant. The impact on net performance and the required investment has been considered to assess the relative advantages of several configurations.