Sugarcane‐derived ethanol is a key renewable fuel, contributing to energy security and climate change mitigation by replacing fossil‐based fuels in tropical regions. This article introduces an integrated exergy–economic–environmental–life cycle assessment (LCA) framework for a sugarcane cogeneration system, providing novel benchmarks and optimization insights for sustainable ethanol and bioelectricity production in Northeast Brazil. An LCA was developed to provide environmental data for the exergoenvironmental analysis. The system has a processing capacity of 200 t/h of sugarcane and produces 33 MW of electricity using two steam turbines, with 22 MW of electricity being exported and 480 m 3 of hydrated ethanol produced daily. The furnace presents the highest exergy destruction rate (32. 53%). The global exergy efficiency is 29. 95%. The specific costs of ethanol and electricity are 0. 3882 US/L and 0. 05929 US/kWh (59. 29 US/MWh). The cost of sugarcane is primarily due to diesel consumption in the agricultural stage and transportation to the site. The specific environmental impacts of ethanol and electricity are 829 mPt/L and 112. 1 mPt/kWh. The combustion and bioelectricity phase, as well as the juice concentration phase, should have their efficiencies improved, with financial investments to reduce the cost rate of exergy destruction and increase exergoeconomic performance. The combustion and bioelectricity phase presents the highest environmental impact due to furnace emissions, while efficiency improvements in juice concentration and distillation can reduce exergy destruction and related environmental impacts.
Cavalcanti et al. (Thu,) studied this question.