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Showing posts with label Electric vehicles. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Electric vehicles. Show all posts

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

Carbon Recycling Technology (CRT) is a potential solution for Zero Carbon Emission.

What is CRT?
CRT is a process technology that captures CO2 from existing and operating base load (24 x 7) power plants using fossil fuels and substituting the Oxygen in CO2 with renewable Hydrogen thereby converting CO2 into RNG (renewable natural gas). Then RNG becomes the renewable fuel for the above power plant. It is a perfect example of a circular economy with Zero Carbon emissions.
CRT becomes a link between fossil power industry and renewable industry, and it can achieve zero Carbon emission in the shortest possible time frame averting a catastrophic climate change.
Why CRT?
The climate change is a global issue and it requires a global solution and eliminating CO2 emission by few countries will not address the problem and it will require a collective solution. CRT can provide such a solution.
The world is now divided than ever before into two segments. One segment believes Carbon emission is causing global warming and climate change and therefore CO2 should be curtailed or eliminated completely, and all future energy should come only from renewable energy sources such as solar wind etc to avert climate change.

The other segment believes the science of climate change is not well established and dismisses the theory that CO2 causes global warming and climate change. They believe such a change is a natural phenomenon and it has nothing to do with CO2 emissions.  They fear by simply eliminating fossil fuel usage in the absence of a clear substitute the energy industry will be seriously disrupted causing economic collapse and the security of a nation. For example US has become the largest exporter of oil and gas in the world due to their aggressive policy of exploiting oil and gas reserves using techniques such as fracking. However these resources are finite and their CO2 emissions will become a stumbling block in the near future.
 It is a useless exercise to engage in argument without a clear path forward. But I am sure they will certainly agree and support a substitute fuel such as renewable natural gas (RNG) that can generate a base load power with zero carbon emission.
CRT will be able to convince both the above segment of people because it will meet the requirements of both the parties.
The bottom line is we need a system that can guarantee to generate an uninterrupted power 24 x7 with zero Carbon emission irrespective of a method we use if it is sustainable and environmentally friendly.
How do crew in space shuttle get rid of their CO2 emission from their cabin is shown below by NASA.
Carbon recycling technology is like the above process except CO2 is generated by combustion of natural gas as a by-product of base load power generation which is being removed and recycled in the form of RNG (renewable natural gas) using renewable
Hydrogen. Capture Carbon recycling in space

(Utility scale battery storage)
Methan from CO2SNG plant(Methanation plant for CO2 to SNG)
Renewable energy is a low efficient and intermittent source of energy and it may not meet the world’s energy requirement at the current rate. It will require massive energy storage technologies to be deployed in the shortest possible time frame. According to NREL report a 100 Mw PV solar with 240 Mwh storage battery will cost approx. USD 188 mil. To meet a base load power of 2400 Mwh/day the cost of the system will be USD 1.88 billion. The life of storage battery is assumed only at 12 years and will require replacement at least twice in 24 years of its life cycle. The same capacity 100 Mw combined cycle power plant using natural gas will cost only USD 105 mil with a life of at least 25 years. Therefore, renewable energy alone cannot solve the problem of climate change in its current form. It will be prudent to use renewable energy to generate renewable Hydrogen (RH) from water (even seawater) and use it to decarbonize the fossil economy. In fact, this is the solution  world needs right now.
Large(utility) scale battery will require massive amount of exotic material such as Lithium, Nickel, Cobalt etc which are not renewable and will have a large carbon footprint and disposal of depleted batteries will create massive environmental problems in the future. They are simply not sustainable.
Combined cycle power generation using natural gas is a proven technology that has been used for decades and all the infrastructure required are already in place.
What is involved in CRT?
CRT will involve the following three sections:
  1. Renewable energy facility such as PV solar, Concentrated solar or wind, geothermal, OTEC and hydro etc.
  2. Renewable Hydrogen facility to generate and store Hydrogen using the above renewable energy sources.
  3. Combined cycle base load power plant with CO2 capture and storage using either pre or post combustion technologies.
  4. Conversion of captured CO2 into renewable natural gas RNG which can substitute natural gas in the above base load power plant with zero Carbon emission.
There are number of renewable energy industries established all over the world in the past decade and they are currently operational. The lowest power tariff quoted by renewable energy industry in India is as low as $ 0.035/kwh making it an attractive clean energy source. There are issues in exporting it to the grid due to peak hour supply and demand gap. This renewable energy can be used to generate renewable Hydrogen (RH) by electrolysis of water. Hydrogen can be used as a storage medium to generate power during peak hours using fuel cells. It can also be used to fuel Hydrogen (Fuel cell) cars. Hydrogen cars have many advantages over battery cars based on life cycle assessment. Renewable Hydrogen (RH) is going to help accelerating the decarbonization process of the world soon.
Currently bulk of the power is generated using fossil fuel such as coal, oil and gas. The CO2 emissions can be reduced by 25% by simply switching over from coal to gas. Exiting coal fired power plants can be modified to gas fired plants by replacing their existing boilers. By using RNG the power plant can achieve zero carbon emission while generating base load power.
CRT is a simple and straight forward process technology that can avert global warming and climate change without disrupting existing fossil fuel infrastructure and its power generation while achieving ZERO CARBON EMISSION in the shorted possible time frame. It will promote renewable energy industries in a big way and help decarbonize our economy on a global scale. The cost of renewable energy should further come down so that renewable hydrogen (RH) as well as renewable natural gas (RNG) will become cheaper. Removal of fossil subsidies, taxing carbon emission and subsidizing renewable energy can facilitate such a transition and quicken the process of decarbonization and avert the climate change. A detailed financial model will reveal how quickly and effectively CRT can help countries reduce their emissions.
High CO2 emitting countries such as China, US, India, Australia, Japan, EU and others should adopt this technology .This technology is compatible with transportation technologies such as electric vehicles and Hydrogen (Fuel cell) vehicles because it can generate base load power (24 x 7) with Zero Carbon emission which are essential for the success of the above transport applications. WithoutCRT the transport applications will collapse even if they are "the state of art" technologies.


Saturday, May 4, 2019

Can renewable technologies mitigate climate change?


Energy generation and usage is considered not only as a mark of progress of a nation but also security of a nation. That is why countries go to extraordinary lengths to achieve such a security and everything else becomes secondary in the path of their goal. That is why countries with high oil and gas reserves enjoy good relationship and privileges with powerful nations of the world. Countries who do not have their own oil and gas reserves and who completely rely on import of oil and gas have no choice but maintain a good relationship with oil rich countries despite their difference in ideologies and policies. But with warming globe and changing climate the dependence on fossil fuels is fast becoming unsustainable and countries look for alternatives. It is good news for the whole world especially for nations who depend completely on import of oil and gas because they can develop their own renewable energy sources to lower their emissions. But there is one major difference. Countries who depend on import of oil and gas required to develop only an infrastructure to store and distribute oil and gas, But with renewable energy they have to develop an infrastructure to produce the hardware necessary to use alternative energy sources such as solar, wind, geothermal but also energy storage such as batteries. The warming globe and changing climate have become a grave threat to the plant earth and a threat to lives of entire future generations. It is the greatest challenge of the industrialized world. One can view this as threat or as an opportunity. But it is time to act irrespective of our views and we must act now. It is an opportunity for scientists and engineers to view energy sources and their applications in a new perspective. It is an opportunity to understand how human activities affect our environment and how not to damage them but preserve them for our future generations while developing new alternatives. Humanity is just a part of a larger environment and any damage to planet earth is at our own peril. It is an ancient wisdom, but we neglected them. When an aboriginal of Australia said “we belong to earth and earth does not belong to us” we failed to listen to them. We(people) became bigger than They (environment). In pursuit of a new energy source one must be extremely careful in examining Nature and how she operates so that we do not make the same mistakes of the past. As we develop renewable energy as a potential energy source of the future, we should be aware of the life cycle of such a system and their impact on environment. Renewable energy requires hardware that uses exotic metals, catalysts, polymers, new Carbon sources and glasses. As we switch to Carbon free economy, we should make sure that there are no emissions in developing renewable energy sources and if necessary impose Carbon tax on such emissions and, to develop recycling technologies to recycle that hardware safely and environmentally friendly manner. It is critically important issue as we move forward. According to an article published in Chemical engineering News “The potential quantities of waste are enormous. By 2025, waste batteries removed from electric vehicles will total 95 Giga watt hours, according to an estimate by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. That pile will weigh roughly 600,000 metric tons. A similar amount of old solar panels will have accumulated by then, according to projections by the International Renewable Energy Agency. IRENA anticipates solar panel waste could reach 78 million metric tons by 2050. And Europe could see 300,000 metric tons per year of decommissioned wind turbine blades in the next two decades, says the trade association Wind Europe. Each year, approximately 300,000 metric tons of lithium-ion battery waste is generated around the world, says Sheetanshu Upadhyay, an analyst with India’s Esticast Research & Consulting. Most of those batteries come from mobile devices, but that waste will soon be overshadowed by old electric car batteries. Sales of plug-in electric vehicles are expected to surpass 2.6 million in 2020, according to Navigation Research.” The above data shows the amount of CO2 emission associated with implementation of renewable energy sources soon. There is a potential for large scale recycling industries on renewables, but it will come with a price and environmental issues. Right now, the main problem is the CO2 emission and the only way to tackle this problem is impose Carbon tax on emissions while encouraging industries with low emission technologies. It should be possible for UN to pass a unanimous resolution among the nations to address climate change by imposing Carbon tax uniformly across the nations. By such resolution UN can bring all those countries to the table who are currently reluctant to be a party to the Paris accord. Countries can use “Carbon rating” similar to “energy ratings” currently used for measuring energy efficiencies in appliances such as Heaters and air-conditioners. The lowest emitting technologies will get the highest Carbon rating while high emission technologies will get the lowest Carbon ratings. By using such a method countries who are reluctant to act on climate change will be disadvantaged; they will not be able to compete in international market or export their goods to low emitting countries based on Carbon ratings.