A total cost of ownership comparison of log truck decarbonization in pulp mills

The Global carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions from energy combustion and industrial processes have steadily increased along the time to more than 80% in the last 30 years. Many efforts are being made to set policies and international targets to reduce the Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHG). Transport globally accounts for 30% of final energy consumption, and still is only 4.1% based on renewable sources. Thus, decarbonization is an important challenge, especially in long-distance heavy duty vehicles, as non-fossil fuel technologies are not mature enough for large scale implementation. There is a broad list of alternative fuel technologies being developed, from ethanol, biodiesel, HVO, biomethane, natural gas (compressed or liquified), electric hydrogen fuel cells, hybrids, and fully electric vehicles. The pulp and paper sector has the wood fibers coming from planted forests as the primary and renewable power source, being energy self-sufficient and generating a surplus, which is usually sold to the market. Therefore, this study analyzed the potential application of promising low emission heavy duty trucks for log transportation in a Brazilian pulp industry, integrated to the pulp mill energy generation. Owing to uncertainty of several variables, a sensitivity analysis was performed to check costs and benefits using the Monte Carlo simulation. Results were: Electric truck option with lower TCO per kilometer, 1.52 USD/km; gas options LNG, 1.59 USD/km and CNG 1.73 USD/km; Diesel with 1.87 USD/km and highest cost for Fuel Cell, with 2.02 USD/Km. The main inputs impacting the results were fuel costs and distance. The LNG solution was the only one having positive ROI. Although Electric HDT did not yield a positive ROI, it looks like the simplest solution to connect with the energy from the pulp mill and is expected to have the highest market share. Therefore, it has the potential to be the first position in renewable trucks option in pulp mills operations in the medium to long term.