Page 236 - Sustainability in the Process Industry Integration and Optimization

S o f t wa r e T o o l s 213

this lead time is a primary objective of the European Commission’s
Directorate-General for Transport and Energy (DGTREN), which has
funded two related projects, EMINENT (Early Market Introduction
of New Energy Technologies) and EMINENT2 (Klemeš et al., 2005b).
The principal features of these projects are a software tool and an
integrated database of new technologies and sectoral energy supplies
and demands. The software tool is for analyzing the potential
impact of new and underdeveloped energy technologies emerging in
different sectors from different countries. This tool has also been
used in case studies that illustrate the new technologies.
The aim of the EMINENT software is to assess the market
potential of early-stage technologies (ESTs) in various energy supply
chains by evaluating their performance in terms of: (1) CO emissions,
2
(2) costs of energy supply, (3) use of primary fossil energy, and
(4) effects on different subsectors of society. Technology developers
and financial supporters are frequently not aware of all the potential
applications or the relative market attractiveness of such technology
across different countries and sectors of society. Thus, the EMINENT
project provides insight into the market potential that can accelerate
the development of technologies; this benefits research and development
efforts by targeting them more effectively.
The EMINENT tool that evaluates ESTs makes use of two databases:
(1) national energy infrastructures, which contain information on the
number of consumers per sector, type of demand, typical quality of
the energy required, and consumption and installed capacity per end
user and (2) other ESTs and technologies that are already commercial—
including key information on new energy technologies currently
under development and proven energy technologies now available
and in use. The availability, price, and geographical conditions of
primary energy resources differ significantly worldwide, so the impact
of ESTs can be evaluated only within the context of a particular
(national) energy supply system (Klemeš et al., 2007b). The EMINENT
package consists of an integrated resource manager, a demand
manager, and an EST manager as well as databases on resources and
demand. The methodology, as shown in Figure 9.11, can be briefly
summarized as follows:

Resource manager selects, enters, and modifies data on country
resources (electrical, fuel-based, geothermal, hydro, ocean tidal,
wave, and wind energy).
Demand manager describes energy demands per subsector in a
given country; it selects data for the technology assessment, enters

new data, and modifies old data.
Technology manager stores key data on existing technologies and
ESTs.
User input: (1) The sectoral energy demands whose potential supply
by EST is being evaluated; (2) any other peripheral technologies