26 October 2023
Overlooked technology for fossil-free hydrogen
An important technology pathway that is rarely mentioned in the constant search for cost-efficient technologies to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, is biomass-based hydrogen production. It is a technology that researchers are highlighting in the project "The cost of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from road and air transport using biofuels and electric fuels", funded by the Swedish Energy Agency's Bio+ program.
“We can produce fossil-free hydrogen on a large-scale using electrolysis, but we can also do this via biomass gasification, which has been almost completely overlooked. We know that this technology has several attractive technical and environmental advantages, such as the fact that it is robust and offers the opportunity of negative carbon dioxide emissions when carbon dioxide is captured and stored, CCS, Carbon Capture and Storage. The fact that the technology is also economically promising is less well known, and we want to highlight that”, Joakim Lundgren says, professor of Energy Engineering at Luleå University of Technology and Deputy Leader of Centre for Hydrogen Energy Systems Sweden, CH2ESS at Luleå University of Technology, who participated in the work.
Production costs more than competitive
The project has estimated the cost of reducing carbon dioxide emissions with renewable transport fuels, including hydrogen and aviation fuels produced using a wide range of different technologies. The project was led by IVL Swedish Environmental Research, with RISE and Luleå University of Technology as project participants. Joakim Lundgren recently presented parts of the report's findings as well as results from the Sustainable Hydrogen - Potential for Bothnia Gulf Cluster, H2SUS project on bio-based hydrogen, a cooperation between Luleå University och Technology and University of Oulu, funded byH2SUS project on bio-based hydrogen funded by Interreg Aurora, at a major international workshop organised by IEA Bioenergy and the French research funder ADEME in Lyon.
“We show that production costs can be more than competitive compared to electrolysis-based hydrogen when hydrogen is produced via biomass gasification and the carbon dioxide is captured and stored, depending on, among other things, the value of negative carbon dioxide emissions”, he says.
There is also much evidence indicating that the CO2 reduction costs for hydrogen produced by biomass gasification with CCS will be lower than the reduction costs for electrolysis-based hydrogen in the future.
Interest in gasification technology stronger than ever
Biomass gasification is a technology that has been the subject of world-leading research and development in Sweden and at Luleå University of Technology for several decades. The technology has so far only been used on a limited industrial scale. On the one hand, this is because the technology has not yet been tested, on the other hand because the markets for the various applications have significantly changed several times over the years and that support for the introduction of a new technology has been too weak. Interest in gasification technology has been strong since the mid-1970s, but now it is perhaps greater than ever. This is mainly due to the characteristics of the technology: flexibility of fuels, wide range of end products and the possibility to use it in many areas through adaptations, e.g. as a substitute for fossil fuels in industry, efficient cogeneration in the district heating sector and for the production of renewable fuels, biomethane or fossil-free hydrogen.
There are several gasification technologies available today that can be introduced on an industrial scale in the short term and that can meet industrial and societal needs in a future fossil-free energy system.
They harmonize very well
Joakim Lundgren certainly does not think biomass gasification is the "silver bullet", but the technology to produce fossil-free hydrogen deserves much more attention, especially in forest-rich countries like Sweden and Finland. Furthermore, there are enormously exciting potential synergies between biomass gasification and electrolysis.
“I am convinced that the emerging hydrogen economy harmonizes very well with the bioeconomy," he says.
Contact
Joakim Lundgren
- Professor
- 0920-491307
- joakim.lundgren@ltu.se
- Joakim Lundgren
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