As part of the project, FuelCell Energy, based in Danbury, Conn., will receive $23.7 million to install and operate a 2-MW molten carbonate fuel cell customized for carbon capture.
The contract for this grant is expected to be finalized by the end of September, the utility site will be selected sometime later this fall, and the project will be installed in 2016. It is one of eight carbon-capture pilot projects being funded by the DOE Office of Fossil Energy.
While several processes can generate electricity electrochemically, FCE's carbonate fuel cell offers the unique side benefit of carbon capture. This was a happy accident.
Tony Leo, FCE's VP for Application Engineering and New Technology Development, explained: "While we were developing this technology, during our initial tests, other side reactions showed up. Carbon-capture was one of them. This is a natural effect of our power generation cycle."
According to Leo, when the fuel cell is operating in power generation mode, it's transferring a large amount of carbon dioxide from one of electrode to the other. The carbon dioxide can then be easily extracted from the second electrode, where it can be cooled, purified and compressed for storage or secondary uses.
"We just route the exhaust flue gas into the air intake for the fuel cell, and on the other side we end up with pressurized liquid carbon dioxide," said Leo.
FCE has already demonstrated that this process works, but the DOE test will be its first application at a working coal plant.
"We're absolutely sure it'll work," said Kurt Goddard, FCE's VP for Investor Relations. "So we're intending to market this benefit to natural gas and coal utilities. Also, we think industrial customers will be interested - to clean up exhaust from their boilers, cement kilns, and similar applications. We think that exploiting this side reaction is potentially the lowest-cost way to capture carbon."
FCE fuel cells are already being used by some utilities - including Dominion, which installed them at a 14.9-MW generating station in Bridgeport, Conn., in 2012. But using them specifically to reduce emissions at existing coal and natural gas plants will be a new twist.
Another fortuitous side reaction of FCE's technology is that contact with the carbonate fuel cell's membranes also destroys up to 70% of nitrous oxide, a pollutant regulated under the U.S. Clean Air Act. This reaction will be tested at utility scale in the DOE pilot, as well.
Carbonate fuel cells allow an incremental approach to removing carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide from fossil-fuel combustion emissions. "The technology scales up very well," said Goddard. "You can start with one unit, and add more over time. Other carbon capture systems are large and expensive - and they're harder to approach incrementally, since they become expensive as they scale down."
FCE fuel cells need a supply of natural gas to operate. In most cases, power plants already have natural gas available on site. However, some coal plants may need to spend money to bring in natural gas lines for the fuel cells.
But once operating, fuel cells can run 24/7, adding predictable baseload electrical generation capacity. In several states, fuel cell-produced power meets renewable portfolio standards, which can help utilities meet clean energy mandates.
This initial DOE-funded pilot is just the beginning. The expected second phase, at the same site, would install 11 additional fuel cells. In total, this could capture 700 tons of carbon dioxide daily, while simultaneously generating about 648,000 kWh per day.
So what would happen with all that liquefied carbon dioxide?
Large-scale carbon storage options are still being researched, though large-scale commercial deployment in the U.S. is not expected for another 10-20 years.
For now, there are some industrial uses for captured carbon dioxide, especially for enhancing oil extraction - which illustrates the mottled shades of green in carbon-capture and storage technology. By potentially enabling coal plants to keep operating as environmental regulations tighten, would improved carbon-capture and storage ultimately be helping or hurting the environment? The answer to that, of course, depends on how extreme your point of view might be. "
https://www.energybiz.com/article/15/09/innovation-carbon-capturing-fuel-cells
Accordingly research done by The American Gas & Oil Reporter industrial produced CO2 is valued at $40.00 per metric ton. It is estimated that at least 17 billion tons of "new industrial CO2 sources" will be required in the U.S. alone over for Enhanced Oil Recovery over the next 30 years (approx $22 billion worth of CO2 per year).
"Oil Recovery Potential
The U.S. Department of Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory concludes that “next-generation” CO2 EOR can provide 135 billion barrels of incremental technically recoverable oil in the United States, with about half of that total (66 billion barrels) economically recoverable at a West Texas Intermediate oil price of $85 a barrel, a CO2 market price of $40 a metric ton, and a 20 percent return on investment before tax.
As shown in Figure 3, technical CO2 storage capacity potential offered by EOR operations would equal 45 billion metric tons. More than 19 billion metric tons of CO2 will need to be purchased by EOR operators to recover the 66 billion barrels of economically recoverable oil. Of this, about 2 billion metric tons would be from natural sources and currently operating natural gas processing plants capturing CO2. The remainder of the CO2 demand would need to be provided by new industrial CO2 sources. This market for captured CO2 emissions would be sufficient to store the emissions from 91, 1-gigawatt coal-fired power plants over 30 years, according to the NETL analysis.
In addition, CO2 EOR could be applied to residual oil zones, which exist below the oil/water contact in the lower portions of oil reservoirs that have been hydro-dynamically swept by the movement of water over geologic time. One may label this movement of water and its displacement of oil as “nature’s waterflood.” Because the “left behind” oil in the ROZ is at or near residual oil saturation, CO2 EOR is required to remobilize and recover this oil."
https://www.aogr.com/magazine/editors-choice/industrial-co2-supply-crucial-for-eor
Smart CO2 Transformation SCOT
On 28 September the SCOT (Smart CO2 Transformation) FP7 project will hold its mid-term conference on Carbon Dioxide Utilisation (CDU) in Essen, Germany.
The conference is to discuss the role of carbon dioxide utilisation (CDU) in a European industrial renaissance. It aims to actively engage academics, politicians and industry to discuss the Vision and business opportunities of CDU up to 2030.
The floor will then be open for the views of high level speakers from politics and industry and SCOT wants to hear the voices of a wide range of participants. Break-out sessions in smaller groups will also provide opportunities for intense knowledge exchange and discussions on the various aspects of #useCO2 policy and technical issues.
At the end of the conference, SCOT is organising a matchmaking event to allow people to find projects and partners to respond successfully to the European research calls of 2016 on Carbon Dioxide Utilisation
Participation in the SCOT conference (including the matchmaking event) costs €50 and you can register here.
Objective
"Reducing CO2, protecting the environment and our resources but also reducing dependency on raw materials are major societal challenges. In this context, the EU has adopted ambitious goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 80-95% below 1990 levels by 2050. So far, most attention from policy makers and industry has been paid to Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) which intends to concentrate CO2 and store it into geological sites.
The current SCOT project is focusing on an emerging and insufficiently addressed area presenting strong research, market development and economic growth potential: the recycling / utilization of CO2 through its transformation into valuable products via chemical or biological technologies. In addition to reducing net CO2 emissions, this approach brings the benefit of reducing the consumption of non-renewable resources. Indeed, CO2 is no longer considered as a waste but as an efficient resource enabling industries to:
- reduce dependency on fossil fuels and primary raw materials for the production of industrial and transportation fuels, basic chemicals, and building materials;
- increase the use of renewable energies from intermittent sources (e.g. solar, photovoltaic, or wind) by providing a solution for electricity storage, via the conversion of CO2 into gaseous or liquid fuels in periods where potential production exceeds demand on the grid and would otherwise be wasted.
SCOT is the first ever European initiative in the field of CO2 recycling / utilization.
Through a stronger coordination of efforts among the consortium, the SCOT project will enable to:
- define a Strategic European Research Agenda aimed at developing new breakthrough solutions and market applications
- attract additional EU clusters, regions and investors to participate to multi-disciplinary research programmes and other collaborative actions defined in a Joint Action Plan
- propose structural policy measures to favour the transition to a new European society based on the paradigm of “CO2-as-a-resource”, thereby significantly improving the EU’s overall competitive position and environmental performance on the international scene."