Techno-economic evaluation of developing a zero-carbon highway service area energy system

To further reduce CO2 emissions from highway service areas, this study proposes a novel zero-carbon highway service area energy system (S3). This system not only addresses energy supply challenges in remote locations but also expedites the reduction of CO2 emissions. A mixed-integer linear programming problem is formulated to optimize the configuration and operation of the proposed system. The system is compared with the conventional (S1) and low-carbon (S2) highway service area systems. Focused on northwest China, the results indicate that S3 can achieve zero CO2 emissions. However, the energy efficiency ratio (EER) of S1 is the highest at 84%, surpassing S3 by 2.4% (82%). In terms of economic analysis, the total cost and levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) of S1 are the highest at 1.62 MUSD and 0.14 USD/kWh, respectively. These values are 100% and 180% higher than those of S3, which are 0.81 MUSD and 0.05 USD/kWh.