I run techno-economic assessments (TEA) for companies, SMEs, and research consortia aiming to decide whether a decarbonisation technology actually works on paper before they commit capital to it. The output is a decision-grade view of cost per tonne of CO2 avoided, levelised cost of capture or production, net present value, and the assumptions that would break the project.
Most clients come to me when they have a promising technology at TRL 3 to 6, a board paper or a grant deadline, and no in-house team to run the financial and process modelling end-to-end. Engagements range from a focused four-week scoping exercise for a single technology to multi-month assessments involving several technologies, sensitivity analyses, and Monte Carlo uncertainty quantification.
If you already know you need a techno-economic assessment, book a scoping call at the bottom of this page. If you are still working out whether you need one, the rest of this page is written for you.
When you need a techno-economic assessment
A techno-economic assessment is the right next step in four common situations.
- Before a Final Investment Decision. You have a pilot or demonstrator that works technically and now need a defensible economic case to take to the board, an investor, or a project sponsor.
- Before a grant or tender submission. Innovate UK, DESNZ, Horizon Europe, IDRIC, and similar funders increasingly want a credible cost-per-tonne figure and a sensitivity analysis in the application, not just a technology readiness narrative.
- Before choosing between technology routes. Solvent capture or solid sorbents. Blue hydrogen or green hydrogen. Direct air capture as DAC-S or DAC-L. A TEA gives you a like-for-like comparison rather than vendor marketing.
- Before scaling a process from lab to pilot. If the economics do not survive a tenfold scale-up under realistic feedstock and energy prices, that is cheaper to learn now than after a pilot is built.
If your question is at TRL 1 to 2, a TEA is too early — you do not yet have enough process data to populate one honestly. At TRL 7 and above, you usually need a FEED study rather than a TEA. The sweet spot is TRL 3 to 6.
What a techno-economic assessment answers
Every TEA I run is built around three to five specific questions agreed with you in the scoping call. The questions act as the contract — they define what you will get an answer to. Typical examples:
- What is the cost per tonne of CO2 avoided, expressed in £ per tonne, for this technology at this site?
- What is the levelised cost of capture (LCOC), or the levelised cost of hydrogen, electricity, or product, under a defined set of assumptions?
- What is the project net present value (NPV) and internal rate of return (IRR) over a 25 to 30 year horizon?
- Which input assumptions move the answer the most — fuel price, capture rate, capacity factor, discount rate, carbon price?
- How does this option compare to two or three benchmark technologies on the same basis?
- What is the probability that the project clears a target NPV under uncertainty?
You do not get a single number. You get a number, the assumptions behind it, the range of plausible outcomes, and a clear view of what would need to change for the project to fail or succeed.
How I run a techno-economic assessment
The methodology follows the eTEA framework and aligns with ISO 14076 where relevant, so the work stands up to grant assessors and technical reviewers. There are four stages.
1. Process modelling and mass-energy balance
I build a process flow model (in Aspen Plus, custom Python, or a hybrid) that captures key unit operations, mass and energy balances, and utility demands. The model is sized to the question, not over-engineered. For an early-stage technology, I may need to rely on literature correlations and conservative assumptions; I will tell you where I do so.
2. CAPEX and OPEX build
Equipment costs come from a registry of correlations (heat exchangers, pumps, compressors, fans, reactors, steam turbines, heat recovery) plus vendor quotes where the technology is novel enough to warrant them. The correlations use power-law scaling factors (typically n = 0.6 to 0.7) — which is the engineering expression of technical economies of scale, where doubling capacity costs less than double. Indirect costs, contingency, and total overnight cost follow standard engineering economics practice. OPEX splits into variable (feedstock, utilities, consumables) and fixed (labour, maintenance, insurance, overheads).
3. Financial modelling
Year-by-year cash flow over the project lifetime. Outputs include NPV, IRR, payback, LCOC or equivalent levelised cost, and a transparent breakdown of where the money goes. The model is built in Python with Excel inputs and outputs, so you can interrogate every number rather than receiving a black box.
4. Sensitivity, uncertainty, and benchmarking
One-way sensitivity (tornado plot) shows which inputs the answer is most exposed to. Two-way sensitivity (heatmap) shows where the project flips from viable to non-viable. Monte Carlo simulation under defined input distributions gives you the probability that the project clears your hurdle rate. Finally, the result is benchmarked against two or three alternative technologies or published reference cases.
What you receive
The standard deliverable set has three components.
- Confidential technical report. Full methodology, assumptions, data sources, calculations, and conclusions. Written so a technical reviewer at IEAGHG, DESNZ, or a major operator can audit the work line by line.
- Presentation deck. Twenty to thirty slides distilling the report for your internal stakeholders — board, investment committee, technical leadership. Pitched at a CEO or Head of Sustainability who needs the decision, not the derivation.
- Raw calculation files. The Python TEA engine plus all Excel input and output files, so your in-house team can re-run scenarios after the engagement ends. You own the model.
Where a TEA sits alongside feasibility studies and life cycle work
A techno-economic assessment answers the economic question. A life cycle assessment answers the environmental question. A feasibility study packages both with business modelling and market analysis to answer the strategic question.
| Service | What it answers |
|---|---|
| Techno-economic assessment | Is this project economically viable, and under what assumptions? |
| Life cycle assessment | What is the cradle-to-grave environmental impact, including embodied emissions? |
| Feasibility study | Should we do this at all — technically, economically, environmentally, commercially? |
| Process modelling and design | Does the process work on paper, and what are the design choices? |
Most clients need both a TEA and an LCA. They are usually delivered as a paired analysis, so the assumptions stay aligned. If you are not sure which you need, the scoping call will sort it.
Sectors and technologies I cover
I have run techno-economic assessments across a wide span of decarbonisation technologies. The strongest published track record is in:
- Carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) — post-combustion solvent capture, oxyfuel, calcium looping, chemical looping
- Direct air capture (DAC) — solid sorbent and liquid solvent routes
- Hydrogen production — blue (with CCS) and green (electrolysis) routes, including PEM and alkaline
- Waste-to-energy with CCUS — including biogenic CO2 removal pathways
- Industrial cluster decarbonisation — hub-and-cluster models, shared CO2 transport and storage infrastructure
- Heat decarbonisation — heat pumps and electrification at industrial and domestic scale
If your technology is not on this list, ask anyway. The methodology is the same; the equipment cost correlations are the part that changes. Most novel technologies need one or two custom correlations added to the engine, which I cost transparently in the proposal.
How we work together
Every engagement follows the same five-step shape, scaled to the size of the project.
Step 1. Scoping call
A free 30-minute call. We agree what you need, who the audience is, what decision the work is feeding, and roughly how big the engagement is. I will tell you honestly if a TEA is the wrong tool for your question.
Step 2. Outline proposal
A short written proposal: three to five key questions, numbered tasks, deliverables, hours per task, day rates, total cost, and timeline. Payment is usually structured as 50% on commissioning and 50% on delivery, though terms can be adjusted for institutional clients with longer procurement cycles.
Step 3. Engagement
Work proceeds through the agreed tasks with fortnightly check-ins for engagements over four weeks. Larger projects use a Gantt schedule. I flag risks early — particularly when an assumption I had to make at the start turns out to be wrong.
Step 4. Deliverables
Final report, deck, and calculation files. A presentation session with your team to walk through findings and answer questions.
Step 5. Follow-up
A 30-day window for follow-up questions on the work, included in the engagement. Many clients then commission a follow-on scope — a sensitivity revision after new data comes in, a second technology added to the comparison, or an LCA layered on top.
Common questions
What is techno-economic analysis?
Techno-economic analysis, sometimes called techno-economic assessment, techno-economic evaluation or cost-benefit analysis, combines process engineering analysis with financial modelling to estimate the economic viability of a technology or project. The output is a set of cost and return metrics under defined assumptions, usually accompanied by sensitivity analysis showing how the results change if those assumptions change. The terms analysis, assessment, and evaluation are used interchangeably in practice, though some institutions prefer one over the others.
What is the difference between a TEA and a techno-economic feasibility study?
Effectively none, in most contexts. “Techno-economic feasibility study” is more often used in early-stage project planning and in funder language; “techno-economic assessment” is more common in academic and consulting work. The scope, methodology, and deliverables are the same.
How long does a techno-economic assessment take?
A focused single-technology TEA usually takes four to eight weeks. A multi-technology comparison with Monte Carlo and benchmarking is usually eight to sixteen weeks. Anything faster than four weeks tends to involve scope cuts I will recommend against.
What does a techno-economic assessment cost?
Engagements range from roughly £8,000 for a tightly scoped single-technology assessment with literature-based inputs, up to £80,000 or more for a full multi-technology, multi-scenario assessment with bespoke process modelling and Monte Carlo uncertainty quantification. The proposal stage gives you a transparent breakdown of hours and day rates so you can adjust scope to budget.
Can you sign an NDA before the scoping call?
Yes. Most clients prefer to. Send your standard form to contact@drhanak.com.
Do you use a single TEA framework or build a custom model each time?
Both. I have an in-house TEA engine that handles the standard structure, CAPEX, OPEX, year-by-year cash flow, NPV, IRR, LCOC, tornado, heatmap, and Monte Carlo and that has been validated against published reference cases to within 0.4% on levelised cost. Each engagement extends the engine with the equipment correlations and assumptions specific to your technology.
How does a techno-economic assessment capture technical economies of scale?
Technical economies of scale, the cost-per-unit reduction that comes from running a larger plant, are baked into the CAPEX side of every TEA through power-law equipment cost correlations. The standard form is C2 = C1 × (S2 / S1)n, where S is capacity, C is cost, and n is the scale exponent (typically 0.6 to 0.7 for chemical process equipment, the so-called “six-tenths rule”).
In practice this means doubling capacity does not double cost. It usually adds 50% to 65%. For carbon capture, hydrogen, and direct air capture projects, technical economies of scale are often the single biggest lever between an early-stage technology being uneconomic at the demonstrator scale and being viable at the commercial scale. A well-built TEA quantifies that lever explicitly: at what capacity does the project clear your hurdle rate, and what is the cost of being smaller? The Python TEA engine I use applies these correlations automatically across the equipment list, so the scale-economy effect propagates through to LCOC and NPV without you having to track it by hand.
Get started
If you have a decarbonisation technology that needs an economic case, the next step is a 30-minute scoping call. No fee, no obligation, and I will tell you honestly if a TEA is the wrong shape of work for your question.
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