Conclusions: Economics

The capital cost of installing each scheme is listed in the table below along with the cost per tonne of CO2 saved over a 20 year period.  More details are given in the economics section on the anticipated maintenance and running costs.  The table shows that despite is large initial capital cost, the Biomass CHP system gives one of the lowest costs per tonne of CO2 saved.  The least cost effective option is photovoltaics, although as discussed in the photovoltaics section, these can be considerably more cost effective if the Feed in Tariff is taken into account.  Demand reduction also has a very high cost per tonne of CO2, however this is distorted by the inclusion of double glazing, which has an extremely high cost per tonne of CO2 saved.  Tree planting seems to be extremely cost effective but the area available for trees in the area is somewhat limited.

Scheme

 Capital cost (£s)

Capital cost per tonnes CO2 saved over 20 year lifecycle (£/tonnesCO2)

Tree planting

5,700

1.5

Biomass

8,840,000

26.2

Energy from waste

67,000

27.7

Wind turbine

2,500,000

45.0

Microalgae

 547,000

53.8

Demand Reduction

25,098,000

241.4

Photovoltaics

9,240,000

509.2

Total Cost

46,298,000

 

Table 2: economics