Thursday, October 27, 2022, 16:00
OFLG/402
Remo Schäppi, ETHZ
Abstract:
The aviation and shipping sectors are strongly dependent on liquid
hydrocarbon fuels derived from fossil fuels and are contributing
approximately 8% of the total anthropogenic CO2 emissions.
Based on projected growth, this proportion could progressively become a
dominant CO2-emissions source, but the decarbonization of
these transportation sectors via battery-driven electric propulsion is
unfeasible for long haul commercial travel. Alternatively, drop-in fuels
- synthetic and completely interchangeable substitutes for conventional
petroleum-derived hydrocarbons (e.g. kerosene, gasoline, diesel,
methanol) - can be synthesized from H2O and CO2
using solar energy.
The presentation reports on the experimental pilot demonstration of a modular solar dish-reactor system for the solar thermochemical fuel production from ambient air using concentrated solar energy. It describes the complete process chain and its key components, and presents representative on-sun runs with fully-automated consecutive CO2-splitting and H2O-splitting redox cycles.
The system integrates three thermochemical units operated in series,
namely: 1) the capture of CO2 and H2O directly
from ambient air via an adsorption-desorption cyclic process; 2) the
co-splitting of CO2 and H2O to generate a specific
mixture of CO and H2 (syngas) via a reduction-oxidation
cyclic process using concentrated solar energy; and, 3) the
gas-to-liquid synthesis of methanol or Fischer-Tropsch fuels.