{"id":14598,"date":"2026-04-30T11:10:56","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T11:10:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/portfolio\/tonny-manalal\/"},"modified":"2026-04-30T11:11:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T11:11:13","slug":"tonny-manalal","status":"publish","type":"us_portfolio","link":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/portfolio\/tonny-manalal\/","title":{"rendered":"Tonny Manalal"},"content":{"rendered":"","protected":true},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":true},"author":7,"featured_media":14599,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"us_portfolio_category":[45],"class_list":["post-14598","us_portfolio","type-us_portfolio","status-publish","post-password-required","hentry","us_portfolio_category-new-template"],"acf":{"naam_van_het_proefschift":"Reimagining petrochemical clusters by defossilising chemical building blocks","samenvatting":"Producten voor dagelijks gebruik zoals verpakkingen, cosmetica, medicijnen, meststoffen, wasmiddelen, verf en brandstoffen, worden voornamelijk gemaakt van fossiele grondstoffen zoals ruwe olie of aardgas. Om de ambitieuze doelstellingen voor CO2-emissiereductie te halen die nodig zijn om klimaatverandering tegen te gaan, is het essentieel om het gebruik van fossiele grondstoffen te vervangen door duurzame koolstofgrondstoffen (d.w.z. defossilisatie). In de huidige petrochemische industrie worden fossiele grondstoffen eerst afgebroken tot chemische bouwstenen (CBB) zoals koolmonoxide, methanol, ethyleen, propyleen, benzeen en xyleen, alvorens ze verder worden verwerkt tot intermediaire chemicali\u00ebn en producten voor dagelijkse basisbehoeften. Deze CBB vormen de ruggengraat van de chemische sector.\n\nDe productie van CBB kan worden gedefossiliseerd door alternatieve koolstofbronnen (ACS) zoals CO2, biomassa en plastic afval als grondstoffen te gebruiken. Het veranderen van de grondstof voor de productie van CBB is echter niet beperkt tot het veranderen van een bepaalde technologie, aangezien CBB over het algemeen worden geproduceerd in sterk met elkaar verbonden petrochemische clusters. Veranderingen in grondstoffen kunnen daardoor domino-effecten veroorzaken in de onderling verbonden waardeketens. Het identificeren en kwantificeren van dergelijke domino-effecten op proces- en clusterniveau was de focus van dit proefschrift.\n\nHet overkoepelende doel van dit proefschrift was het begrijpen van de impact van defossilisatie van de productie van chemische bouwstenen in bestaande petrochemische clusters. Om deze vraag te beantwoorden, werden drie deelonderzoeksvragen geformuleerd:\n\nSRQ-1: Hoe kunnen veelbelovende ACS-gebaseerde procesroutes op verschillende TRL-niveaus worden gescreend voor de productie van chemische bouwstenen?\nSRQ-2: Wat zijn de techno-economische gevolgen van het gebruik van ACS-gebaseerde technologie\u00ebn voor de productie van chemische bouwstenen in bestaande petrochemische clusters?\nSRQ-3: Hoe be\u00efnvloedt de beschikbaarheid van alternatieve koolstofbronnen potenti\u00eble technologieportfolio\u2019s voor de defossilisatie van de productie van chemische bouwstenen in bestaande petrochemische clusters?\n\nScreening van veelbelovende ACS-gebaseerde procesroutes op verschillende TRL-niveaus voor de productie van chemische bouwstenen\n\nVoor de selectie van veelbelovende ACS-technologie\u00ebn werd een screeningmethodologie op basis van het stage-gate-concept ontwikkeld. Uit de beoordeling bleek dat de C:H:O-verhouding van de ACS-grondstoffen een belangrijke rol speelde, aangezien een hoger zuurstofgehalte in de grondstof resulteert in een lagere effici\u00ebntie van koolstofbenutting of een hogere waterstofbehoefte. Plastic afval, dat een vergelijkbare C:H:O-samenstelling heeft als de op fossiele brandstoffen gebaseerde grondstoffen, scoorde beter dan biomassa- en CO2-gebaseerde technologie\u00ebn.\n\nDe resultaten toonden ook aan dat aannames met betrekking tot de oorsprong van waterstof een significante invloed hebben op de rangschikking van technologie\u00ebn. Als de waterstofproductie ter plaatse plaatsvindt, werden directe elektrochemische reductie, stoomvergassing van biomassa en pyrolyse van plastic afval hoger gerangschikt dan routes gebaseerd op de hydrogenering van CO2 tot methanol.\n\nTechnisch-economische gevolgen van het gebruik van ACS-gebaseerde technologie\u00ebn voor de productie van chemische bouwstenen in bestaande petrochemische clusters\n\nOp procesniveau waren de belangrijkste uitdagingen (i) de toegang tot grote hoeveelheden hernieuwbare elektriciteit tegen lage prijzen en (ii) de hoge investeringskosten van ACS-gebaseerde processen. Gemiddeld verbruikten de bestudeerde ACS-processen 5 tot 10 keer meer elektriciteit en water per geproduceerde eenheid ethyleen. Voor aromaten was de route van methanol naar aromaten op basis van plastic afval het meest concurrerend.\n\nDe integratie van ACS-technologie\u00ebn resulteerde in een lager gehalte aan fossiele koolstof en aanzienlijke prijsveranderingen in de waardeketen. Zo zou een prijsverandering van +134% in de levelized cost van ethyleen leiden tot een prijsstijging van 97% voor polyvinylchloride. Vergeleken met de defossilisatie van olefinen resulteerde de defossilisatie van aromaten in de grootste verandering van embedded koolstof in het cluster.\n\nImpact van de beschikbaarheid van alternatieve koolstofbronnen op de potenti\u00eble technologieportfolio\u2019s\n\nEr werden drie casussen onderzocht: een referentiecasus en twee casussen gedefinieerd door de beschikbaarheid van ACS-grondstoffen. Het bereiken van een defossilisatiegraad van 95% resulteerde in een aanzienlijke CAPEX-penalty van circa \u20ac 33 miljard, naast een elektriciteitsbehoefte van 65 PJ per jaar. Om tot 95% defossilisatie te bereiken, zou ongeveer 19.5 miljoen ton plastic afval per jaar nodig zijn, wat meer dan drie keer zoveel is als de huidige plasticproductie in Nederland.\n\nToen beperkingen in de grondstoffen werden meegenomen, werd een maximale defossilisatie van 55% bereikt. Dit scenario vereiste ongeveer 200 PJ\/jaar elektriciteit, 3 Mt\/jaar CO2, 8 Mt\/jaar biomassa en 7 Mt\/jaar plastic afval. De studie schatte dat er een CAPEX-penalty van ongeveer 35 miljard euro zou worden opgelopen om tot 55% van het cluster te defossiliseren.\n\nDit onderzoek wijst erop dat de beperkingen in de beschikbaarheid van ACS-grondstoffen een aanzienlijke impact zullen hebben op de prestaties van bestaande industri\u00eble clusters. De omvang van de benodigde energie en materiaal toont aan dat een grote uitdaging de 5 tot 10 keer hogere elektriciteits- en waterbehoefte zal zijn. Dit betekent dat ofwel de productiecapaciteit moet worden afgeschaald, ofwel strategische beslissingen moeten worden genomen over welke chemische stof in het cluster geproduceerd moet worden.","summary":"Today\u2019s day-to-day essentials like packaging, cosmetics, medicines, fertilisers, detergents, paints and fuels are made primarily from fossil-based raw materials such as crude oil or natural gas. To reach the ambitious CO2 emission reduction targets needed to mitigate climate change, replacing the use of fossil-based feedstocks with sustainable carbon feedstocks (i.e. defossilisation) will be vital. In today\u2019s petrochemical industry, fossil-based raw materials are first broken down into chemical building blocks (CBB) such as carbon monoxide, methanol, ethylene, propylene, benzene and xylene before further processing into intermediate chemicals and the day-to-day essentials. These CBB are the backbone of the chemical sector.\n\nCBB production can be defossilised by using alternative carbon sources (ACS) such as CO2, biomass and plastic waste as feedstocks. However, changing the feedstock to produce CBB is not just limited to changing a given technology, as CBB are generally produced in highly interconnected petrochemical clusters. Petrochemical clusters are a spatial concentration of related and\/or directly connected industries. They provide competitive advantages in terms of shared infrastructure, knowledge, materials, and or energy. Thus, changes in feedstock can result in ripple effects along the interconnected value chains. Identifying and quantifying such ripple effects at process and cluster levels were the focus of this dissertation.\n\nThe overarching aim of this PhD thesis was to understand the impacts of defossilising the production of chemical building blocks in existing petrochemical clusters. To answer this question, three sub-research questions were proposed, as shown below.\n\nSRQ-1: How to screen promising ACS-based process routes at different TRLs to produce chemical building blocks?\nSRQ-2: What are the techno-economic impacts of using ACS-based technologies for the production of chemical building blocks in existing petrochemical clusters?\nSRQ-3: How does the availability of alternative carbon sources affect potential technology portfolios for defossilising the production of chemical building blocks in existing petrochemical clusters?\n\nThe reference and ACS-based technologies were modelled in Aspen Plus with design, operating capacities and process complexities similar to those in current CBB production plants in the Port of Rotterdam (PoR), the Netherlands. The technologies were then assessed using key performance indicators (KPIs) at both process and cluster levels. Finally, this thesis evaluated the technology portfolio required for defossilising the production of CBB (methanol, ethylene, propylene, benzene, p-xylene) and examined how limitations in ACS feedstock availability could affect the design and performance of a defossilised brownfield petrochemical cluster.\n\nScreening promising ACS-based process routes at different TRLs for the production of chemical building blocks\n\nWith the need to defossilise the petrochemical sector, many possible process routes that use ACS are under development. For instance, more than 65 different ACS-based process routes were identified in the literature for producing ethylene. These multiple options are at different technology readiness levels, making the selection of promising process route a complex task. A screening methodology based on the stage-gate concept was developed to select promising ACS technologies to further study in this thesis. The method used ideal stoichiometric reactions and thermodynamic state functions at standard temperature and pressure conditions with carbon utilisation efficiency, electricity and heat needs as key performance indicators.\n\nThe assessment showed that the C:H:O ratio of the ACS feedstocks played a major role in the technical performance of the process as higher oxygen content in the feedstock results in lower carbon utilisation efficiencies or higher hydrogen need. For example, given that the oxygen content of CO2, biomass and plastic waste are 73 wt%, 49 wt% and 0 wt% respectively; CO2 requires the highest energy input for oxygen removal through hydrogenation or electrochemical reduction for CBB production. Plastic waste, which has a similar C:H:O composition compared to the fossil fuel-based feedstocks, scored better than biomass and CO2 based technologies in the screening methodology.\n\nThe results also showed that assumptions regarding the origin of hydrogen significantly impact the ranking of technologies. For example, when assuming that hydrogen is imported, the screening methodology identifies exothermic technologies based on hydrogenation of CO2-to-methanol and oxygen gasification of biomass or plastic waste as preferable routes for further examination. If, however, the production of hydrogen is done onsite, direct electrochemical reduction, biomass steam gasification and plastic waste pyrolysis are ranked higher than the exothermic routes mentioned above, in terms of material and energy efficiencies. This is because the material and energy penalties of the highly endergonic hydrogen production processes were not included in the hydrogen import case.\n\nTechno-economic impacts of using ACS-based technologies for the production of chemical building blocks in existing petrochemical clusters\n\nReplacing fossil-based processes in interconnected industrial clusters can impact upstream supply chains, downstream units, energy islands, waste treatment plants, and change the overall performance of a cluster. To address this knowledge gap, the impact of the ACS-based production routes (selected using the screening methodology) were analysed at cluster level by assessing changes in mass, energy, prices, CO2 emissions and water demand. The results show that due to the significant differences in product distribution, energy needs, and waste generation of ACS-based processes, the petrochemical cluster will need to undergo significant reconfiguration efforts both in terms of mass and energy flows.\n\nAt the process level, the main challenges to defossilisation olefins and aromatics were (i) access to large quantities of renewable electricity at cheap prices, particularly for hydrogen production, and (ii) the large investment costs of ACS-based processes compared to fossil fuel-based technologies. In general, plastic waste-based technologies showed a better performance than the biomass and CO2 based technologies, due to their better C\/H ratio of the feedstock, leading to lower external hydrogen demand and higher product yields.\n\nFor olefins, at the cluster level, replacing the naphtha cracker with ACS-based technologies poses significant challenges. This is mainly due to differences in product profiles and the need for substantial changes in electricity, water, and waste treatment infrastructure. On average, the ACS-based processes studied in this thesis needed 5 to 10 times more electricity and water per unit of ethylene produced. The significant difference in utility needs would require a complete overhaul of the energy and utility plants to integrate the ACS-based processes into the cluster. Ripple effects on the structure of the cluster due to defossilisation were seen because of the difference in the product-to-byproduct ratio (i.e., mainly for propylene, off-gases and heavy hydrocarbons in the ACS cases. This was particularly the case for the CO2-based direct electrochemical reduction process to produce ethylene, in which no propylene is produced. As a result, propylene would need to be imported, introducing logistical and environmental challenges if for instance, the propylene would be of fossil origin.\n\nFor aromatics production, among the ACS-based routes, the plastic waste-based methanol-to-aromatics route was the most competitive, with the lowest impact at the cluster level. At the cluster level, the main differences among the processes were found in the production of xylene, off gas production, electricity and water requirements, and waste treatment infrastructure. Significant differences in utility needs were mainly due to the high hydrogen need and higher pressure requirements for the methanol production process compared to the existing fossil-based processes. The higher water demand was due to the water electrolysis and steam gasification process required to produce the syngas needed for the methanol production process. About 80%-90% of both the electricity and CAPEX was accounted by the ACS to methanol production process.\n\nIntegrating ACS-based technologies resulted in lower fossil carbon content and significant price changes along the value chains. For example, a +134% price change in the levelised cost of ethylene from an ACS processes would alone result on a 97% increase in price of polyvinyl chloride and a 34% price increase in polyethylene terephthalate. Compared to the defossilisation of olefins, defossilising aromatics resulted on the highest change in embedded carbon in the cluster, as aromatics account for over 50% of the embedded carbon in the cluster.\n\nImpact of availability of alternative carbon sources on the potential technology portfolios for defossilising the production of chemical building blocks in existing petrochemical clusters\n\nFor producing the same quantity of CBB, larger quantities of ACS-based feedstocks will be required compared to fossil-based feedstocks due to the low carbon and hydrogen content of ACS-based feedstocks. Three cases were explored: a reference case, and two cases defined by availability of ACS feedstocks. One with no limits and another with limited availability.\n\nA comparison of the technology portfolios between the unlimited and limited ACS cases showed a variation of 2 to 8 times in CAPEX penalty, energy estimates and water demand. Achieving a 95% defossilisation rate resulted in a significant capital expenditure (CAPEX) penalty of approximately \u20ac33 billion, alongside an electricity demand of 65 PJ per year. Furthermore, water demand in the cluster rose from 2 million tonnes per year in the reference case to 14 million tonnes per year in the defossilisation scenario with unlimited availability of feedstocks, primarily driven by the steam gasification process used to convert plastic waste into methanol via syngas.\n\nWhen limitations in feedstocks were included in the model, the maximum defossilisation obtained was 55% of CBB production. This case required around 200 PJ\/y electricity, 3 Mt\/y of CO2, 8 Mt\/y biomass and 7 Mt\/y of plastic waste. The study estimated that around 35 billion EUR of CAPEX penalty will be incurred to defossilise up to 55% of the cluster, which is about 18 times the CAPEX of the fossil-based CBB production plants. The results indicate that, given ACS feedstock limitations and current demands of CBB, a combination of ACS and fossil-based technologies will need to co-exist. There is no single \u201csilver bullet\u201d process or feedstock that can fully defossilise CBB production; instead, a combination of ACS feedstocks will be required.\n\nThis work points out that ACS feedstock limitations will significantly impact the performance of existing brown-field industrial clusters. The magnitude of energy and material required for such a change shows that a large challenge for existing petrochemical clusters, similar to the Port of Rotterdam, will be the 5 to 10 times higher electricity and water needs. Another option is to import intermediate renewable carbon feedstocks like methanol, pyrolysis oil, ethanol or Fischer Tropsch naphtha into the cluster. However, as these processes are highly energy, CAPEX, and land-intensive processes, this shift may result in increasing environmental impacts outside the Netherlands, which will need to be examined.","auteur":"Tonny Manalal","auteur_slug":"tonny-manalal","publicatiedatum":"18 mei 2026","taal":"EN","url_flipbook":"https:\/\/ebook.proefschriftmaken.nl\/ebook\/tonnymanalal?iframe=true","url_download_pdf":"https:\/\/ebook.proefschriftmaken.nl\/download\/eac50f58-85d5-4f2f-9cac-35321dfe3a45\/optimized","url_epub":"","ordernummer":"18914","isbn":"978-94-6518-329-9","doi_nummer":"","naam_universiteit":"Overig","afbeeldingen":14600,"naam_student:":"","binnenwerk":"","universiteit":"Overig","cover":"","afwerking":"","cover_afwerking":"","design":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/us_portfolio\/14598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/us_portfolio"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/us_portfolio"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14598"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/us_portfolio\/14598\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14601,"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/us_portfolio\/14598\/revisions\/14601"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"us_portfolio_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.proefschriftmaken.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/us_portfolio_category?post=14598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}