Effect of Hydrogen Co-Firing with Natural Gas on Thermal Efficiency and CO2 Emissions in Gas Turbine Power Plant

The Indonesian government has established an energy transition policy for decarbonization, including the target of utilizing hydrogen for power generation through a co-firing scheme. Several studies indicate that hydrogen co-firing in gas-fired power plants can reduce CO2 emissions while improving efficiency. This study develops a simulation model for hydrogen co-firing in an M701F gas turbine at the Cilegon power plant using Aspen HYSYS. The impact of different hydrogen volume fractions (5–30%) on thermal efficiency and CO2 emissions is analyzed under varying operational loads (100%, 75%, and 50%). The simulation results show an increase in thermal efficiency with each 5% increment in the hydrogen fraction, averaging 0.32% at 100% load, 0.34% at 75% load, and 0.37% at 50% load. The hourly CO2 emission rate decreased by an average of 2.16% across all operational load variations for every 5% increase in the hydrogen fraction. Meanwhile, the average reduction in CO2 emission intensity at the 100%, 75%, and 50% operational loads was 0.017, 0.019, and 0.023 kg CO2/kWh, respectively.