Operation strategies for a flexible megawatt scale electrolysis system for synthesis gas and hydrogen production with direct air capture of carbon dioxide
“…Other possibilities lay in the development of flexible and agile processes, which are still in their infancy, as are studies devoted to the identification of optimal placement of buffer capacities, either within the plant or with respect to energy storage. The water electrolysis community is currently exploring operation under intermittency (Kojima et al, 2023), while this operation modality in ECO2R is currently limited to studies of Solid Oxide Cells (Tomberg et al, 2023). • Power electronics installations.…”
Despite the huge efforts devoted to the development of the electrochemical reduction of CO2 (ECO2R) in the past decade, still many challenges are present, hindering further approaches to industrial applications. This paper gives a perspective on these challenges from a Process Systems Engineering (PSE) standpoint, while at the same time highlighting the opportunities for advancements in the field in the European context. The challenges are connected with: the coupling of these processes with renewable electricity generation; the feedstock (in particular CO2); the processes itself; and the different products that can be obtained. PSE can determine the optimal interactions among the components of such systems, allowing educated decision making in designing the best process configurations under uncertainty and constrains. The opportunities, on the other hand, stem from a stronger collaboration between the PSE and the experimental communities, from the possibility of integrating ECO2R into existing industrial productions and from process-wide optimisation studies, encompassing the whole production cycle of the chemicals to exploit possible synergies.
“…Other possibilities lay in the development of flexible and agile processes, which are still in their infancy, as are studies devoted to the identification of optimal placement of buffer capacities, either within the plant or with respect to energy storage. The water electrolysis community is currently exploring operation under intermittency (Kojima et al, 2023), while this operation modality in ECO2R is currently limited to studies of Solid Oxide Cells (Tomberg et al, 2023). • Power electronics installations.…”
Despite the huge efforts devoted to the development of the electrochemical reduction of CO2 (ECO2R) in the past decade, still many challenges are present, hindering further approaches to industrial applications. This paper gives a perspective on these challenges from a Process Systems Engineering (PSE) standpoint, while at the same time highlighting the opportunities for advancements in the field in the European context. The challenges are connected with: the coupling of these processes with renewable electricity generation; the feedstock (in particular CO2); the processes itself; and the different products that can be obtained. PSE can determine the optimal interactions among the components of such systems, allowing educated decision making in designing the best process configurations under uncertainty and constrains. The opportunities, on the other hand, stem from a stronger collaboration between the PSE and the experimental communities, from the possibility of integrating ECO2R into existing industrial productions and from process-wide optimisation studies, encompassing the whole production cycle of the chemicals to exploit possible synergies.
“…Further scaling/numbering up to model larger SOC modules that may interact with their surroundings will then make them relevant for the developing operating strategies for larger process applications. 15 Most SOC models considering coEl, assume that the main pathway for the consumption of carbon dioxide is through the reverse water gas shift reaction, 16 due to the high operating temperature bringing the RWGS reaction to equilibrium. A model considering the electrochemical reaction kinetics can be used to determine the veracity of this claim and determine the extent of CO 2 electrolysis.…”
Section: List Of Symbolsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…The passive area, denoting the section around the active area in the cell that does not accommodate the electrochemical reaction; but gives the multi-layered SOC reactor mechanical stability, current collection for the reactor, and pre-heats incoming fluids is not considered here. Work on the passive area as well as usage of this framework in larger SOC reactor modules for transient operation has been done by Tomberg et al 23 (also relevant 15 ). The model is capable of both fuel cell, electrolysis and reversible operation, but focus will be put especially on coEl operation.…”
The ability of high-temperature solid oxide cell (SOC) electrochemical reactors to efficiently convert atmospheric carbon to high value chemicals for industrial and energy storage applications via CO2 and co-electrolysis makes them a key technology for active carbon utilisation. However, due to additional operational risks from thermochemical reactions on thermal management, limited experimental capacity, and relative novelty, CO2 and co-electrolysis lag behind steam electrolysis in large-scale adoption. Here, a 1D+1D SOC model based on fundamental first principles considering three-dimensional heat transfer was improved via a unique method for representing co-electrolysis electrochemistry, solving with low computational effort. Validation against experimental data for two compositions and pressures, showed high levels of accuracy with respect to characteristic cell voltages, temperatures, and outlet compositions. The model also showed CO2 reduction during co-electrolysis mainly occurred via reverse water gas shift, while CO2 electrolysis still accounted for up to 35% of the total share. Pressurised co-electrolysis operation promotes exothermic methanation, causing pronounced heating of the reactor, consequently reducing the isothermal current density. Therefore, low to moderate pressurisation is likely most suited for coupling with downstream synthesis processes to avoid the installation of unnecessarily large systems and associated high costs.
“…The up-scale of SOC systems into the MW-scale requires the understanding of the different transient scenarios during operation and how they would influence the performance of these systems, what are the drawbacks and what are the limiting factors that should be improved at the kW-scale (1). In this investigation, different operating conditions during the recirculation of emulated Fischer-Tropsch tail gas were experimentally evaluated with the motivation of increasing the conversion and reduce the net material consumption (2) (3).…”
The emulated coupling of a 100 kW SOC reactor with an emulated tail gas recirculation of a Fischer-Tropsch reactor was investigated. Different syngas ratios (H2/CO) were studied, not only experimentally but also with the support of the in-house simulation framework from DLR, TEMPEST, which is specialized for transient simulations on electrochemical reactors. Different operating conditions were evaluated by: (i) adding CH4 at open circuit voltage (OCV) and under current and (ii) by performing an experimental ramp of the emulated Fischer-Tropsch gas composition into the inlet gases of the SOC reactor. These results allowed to evaluate the performance of the SOC reactor with the temperature profile along the cells and the stacks, as well as with the syngas ratio behavior. Operation strategies are analyzed and discussed with the aim to mitigate failure conditions on SOC reactors, while operating in transient conditions in the frame of syngas production via high temperature co-electrolysis.
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