Search

The exploitation plan already developed during the submission of the MArie Curie project has been refined and improved.

The project GTCLC-NEG foresaw a secondment with Baker Hughes Company production site in Florence. The foreseen activities were: - a model of the CLC combustor with biofuels will be integrated with the NOVA LT16 gas turbine in BHGE (during the secondment). - a technical analysis using BHGE proprietary models, to optimize turbine working conditions using hot air instead of exhaust combustion gases. This work ended up with guidelines to design and optimize a combustor for gas turbines based on CLC technology. Main results are proposed in the next paragraphs.

6 figures, 2 tables.-- ATI Annual Congress (ATI 2022) 11/09/2022 - 14/09/2022 Bari, Italy., Bioenergy combustion with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) is a key technology to achieve carbon negative emissions power generation. This can be achieved by coupling the biofuels combustion with CO2 capture and storage (CCS). The lowest cost for CCS corresponds at the moment to the Chemical Looping Combustion (CLC) process. This can use biofuels which can be gaseous (biomethane, biogas or syngas etc.), liquid (biodiesel, bioethanol, biobutanol and pyrolysis oils etc.) or solids (wood dust, charcoal dust, wood chips, wood pellets etc.) While plant design with gaseous and liquid biofuels would be simpler, plants using solid biofuels and based on two couple fluidisd beds would need the use of a third reactor named carbon stripper. In the specific case if we plan to couple a CLC plant with a turbo expander (to achieve the high efficiencies of a combined cycle power plant) we have to work with pressurized reactors. However, there are some technical barriers to the coupling of a chemical looping combustor with a turbo expander, such as: the operation of the combustor in pressurised conditions; the inventory balance among reactors; elutriated particles reaching the turbo expander. This explaind why there is no commercial plant at the moment capable to do this. The aim of this paper is to present a model for the dimensioning of an air reactor to be coupled to a turbo expander of the power of about 12 MWe. Based on this, the air mass flow can be obtained and the geometric parameters can be calculated, to have an air velocity which is needed to achieve the fast fluidization regime and to ensure a high conversion rate as well as particles and heat exchage among air and fuel reactor., This work has been funded by the GTCLC-NEG project that has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodow-ska-Curie grant agreement No. 101018756.

Work presented at the 6th International Conference on Chemical Looping (CLC 2022), 19th-22nd september, in Zaragoza (Spain)., This work has been partially funded by the GTCLC-NEG project that has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 101018756

A transition from fossil to renewable energy requires the development of sustainable electric energy storage systems capable to accommodate an increasing amount of energy, at larger power and for a longer time. Flow batteries are seen as one promising technology to face this challenge. As different innovations in this field of technology are still under development, reproducible, comparable and verifiable life cycle assessment studies are crucial to providing clear evidence on the sustainability of different flow battery systems. Based on a review of 20 relevant life cycle assessment studies for different flow battery systems, published between 1999 and 2021, this contribution explored relevant methodological choices regarding the sequence of phases defined in the ISO 14,040 series: goal and scope definition, inventory analysis, impact assessment and interpretation. Inspired by good practice examples, common gaps and weaknesses were identified and recommendations for comparative life cycle assessment studies were derived. This includes suggestions for an expanded functional unit definition, a provision of more detailed and transparent reporting of LCI data while using input/output tables. Outcomes of this study are also of relevance for the amendment of the Batteries Directive 2006/66/EC, where first drafts are under revision in the European Council, including the introduction of a battery passport, which should encourage battery producers to reduce their carbon footprint and avoid problematic materials.

1 Online-Ressource (20 Seiten) : Diagramme (2020).

Supplementary data for the computational test case presented in the book chapter:Distribution System Operation with Energy Storage and Renewable Generation Uncertainty

Large Combined Heat and Power (CHP) plants are often employed in order to feed district heating networks, in Europe, in post soviet countries and China. Traditionally they have been operated following the thermal load with the electric energy considered as a by-product, while the modern trend includes them in the electric market to take advantage of the flexibility they could provide. This implies the necessity to consider the impact on the electric grid while filling the thermal load requests. A detailed Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) optimization model for the solution of the network-constrained CHP unit commitment of the day-ahead operation is introduced. The developed model accounts for lossless DC network approximation of the electric power flow constraints, as well as a detailed characterization of the CHP units with useful effect, heat and power, function of one and two independent variables ("degrees-of-freedom"), and thermal energy storage. A computational validation of the outlined model on a CHP test system with multiple heating zones is presented in the form of computational test cases. The test cases illustrate the impact on the flexibility of the implementation of the energy storage, network constraints and joint multi-system operation. The conducted studies have highlighted the importance of a comprehensive and integrated analysis of multi-energy systems to exploit the operational flexibility provided by the cogeneration units. The joint operation of the thermal and electric system allows to reap economic, operational efficiency, and environmental benefits. The developed model can be easily extended to include diverse multi-energy systems and technologies, as well as more complex representations of the energy transmission networks, and the modeling of renewable energy resources dependent of one or more independent, weather-related, variables.

Chemical looping combustion (CLC) is continuously gaining more importance among the carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies. It is an unmixed combustion process which takes place in two steps. An effective way to realize CLC is to use two interconnected fluidized beds and a metallic powder circulating among them, acting as oxygen carrier. The metallic powder oxidizes at high temperature in one of the two reactors, the air reactor (AR). It reacts in a highly exothermic reaction with the oxygen of the injected fluidizing air. Afterwards the particles are sent to the other reactor where the fuel is injected, the fuel reactor (FR). There, they transport heat and oxygen necessary for the reaction with the injected fuel to take place. At high temperatures, the particle’s oxygen reacts with the fuel producing CO2 and steam, and the particles are ready to start the loop again. The overall reaction, the sum of the enthalpy changes of the oxygen carrier oxidation and reduction reactions, is the same as for the conventional combustion. Two are the key features, which make CLC promising both for costs and capture efficiency. First, the high inherent irreversibility of the conventional combustion is avoided because the energy is utilized stepwise. Second, the CO2 is intrinsically separated within the process; so there is in principle no need either of extra carbon capture devices or of expensive air separation units to produce oxygen for oxy-combustion. A lot of effort is taking place worldwide on the development of new chemical looping oxygen carrier particles, reactor systems and processes. The current work is focused on the reactor system: a new design is presented, for the construction of an atmospheric 150kWth prototype working with gaseous fuel and possibly with inexpensive oxygen carriers derived from industrial by-products or natural minerals. It consists of two circulating fluidized beds capable to operate in fast fluidization regime; this will increase the particles concentration in the upper section of the reactors, thus the gas solids contact. They are interconnected by means of two pneumatically controlled divided loop-seals and a bottom extraction/lift. The system is designed to be as compact as possible, to help up-scaling and enclosure into a pressurized vessel, aiming pressurization in a second phase. In addition several industrial solutions have been utilized, from highly loaded cyclones to several levels of secondary air injections. The divided loop-seals are capable to internally re-circulate part of the entrained solids, uncoupling the solids entrainment from the solids exchange. This will provide a better control on the process increasing its flexibility and helping to fulfil downstream requirements. No mechanical valves are utilized, but gas injections. The bottom extraction compensates the lower entrainment of the FR which has less fluidizing gas availability and smaller cross section than the AR. The lift allows adjusting the reactors bottom inventories, thus the pressures in the bottom sections of the reactors. In this way the divided loop-seals are not exposed to large pressure unbalances and the whole system is hydrodynamically more robust. The proposed design was finally validated by means of a full scale cold flow model (CFM), without chemical reactions. A thorough evaluation of the scaling state-of-the-art in fluidization engineering has been done; two are the approaches. One consists of building a small scale model which resembles the hydrodynamics of the bigger hot setup, by keeping constant a set of dimensionless numbers. The other is based on the construction of a full scale model, being careful to be in the same fluidization regime and to utilize particles with the same fluidization properties as the hot setup. In this way the surface to volume ratio is kept the same as that one of the hot rig. The idea presented in this work combines those two strategies, building a full scale CFM. In this way, it can be used for the hot rig design debugging and it is at the same time the hydrodynamic small scale model of a ten times larger industrial application. The adopted scaling strategy and design brought to the construction of one of the world biggest and more complex fluidized bed cold flow model reactor systems. The air and fuel reactor have a height of 5 m and a diameter of respectively 0.230 and 0.144 m. The selected particles are fine and heavy being classifiable as high density Geldart A; there is almost no published literature regarding those particles utilization in circulating fluidized beds. Extensive test campaigns have been performed to hydrodynamically validate the proposed designs. It was possible to understand and evaluate the operational window, the sensitivity to the input parameters and the key design details performance. Control strategies were qualitatively developed. The presented double loop architecture design showed good stability and flexibility at the same time, so that can also suit the requirements of other chemical processes based on two complementary reactions taking place simultaneously and continuously.

8 figures, 6 tables., This paper provides a simple methodology for the design of the air reactor of a chemical looping combustor to optimize its characteristics when it is employed connected to a turbo expander to produce power. The design process, given a certain objective (e.g., electric power) defines the reactor specifics, namely height and diameter, taking into account the following aspects: solids inventory of the air reactor; gas velocity; air reactor transport disengaging height (TDH); solids concentration profile along the reactor height, dense bed height; freeboard height; pressure drop depending on air reactor injectors design and configuration. The total air reactor height was about 9.5 m, while the diameter was about 1.8 m. The total inventory was about 10,880 kg; while the circulation rate in the air reactor was about 110 kg/s. The operating pressure and temperature were, respectively, 12 bar and 1200 °C. The average velocity of the gases inside the reactor was about 4 m/s. The fluidization regime resulted to be comprised between turbulent and fast fluidization. Further work must be directed into the estimate of the pressure drop of the reactor, which will affect the plant efficiency in a considerable way., This work has been funded by the GTCLC-NEG project that has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 101018756.

The PEM fuel cell has been consider as ideal power supply for the lift trucks due to its high efficient and environment-friendly energy production. A new methodology has been proposed for optimal size selection of a PEM fuel cell-Battery hybrid energy system to fulfil load demands of a lift truck. The size of the PEM fuel cell and battery of a hybrid lift truck will heavily affect the overall performance of the vehicle, its fuel economy, battery duration and the fuel cell degradation. The present study concerns a multi-objective design exploration and optimisation of fuel cell size and battery capacity comparing hydrogen fuel consumption, fuel cell lifetime and battery state of charge. The PEM fuel cell-battery power pack have been determined according to the real driving load demand of a lift truck. The optimising method gives the correct dimensioning of the hybrid power system together with the optimization of the battery state of charge control strategy. An individually optimised Energy Management Strategy has to be consider for each application in order to fulfil the objectives of fuel efficiency, battery lifetime and fuel cell degradation. Based on the parameters of the power system, a genetic algorithm was adopted to optimize the parameters of the control algorithm, in order to improve efficiency and durability

Chemical Looping Combustion is one of the most promising way to limit the CO2 release to the atmosphere among the other technologies for Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS). It constitutes an indirect fuel combustion strategy, in which metal oxide is used as oxygen carrier, to transfer oxygen from the combustion air to the fuel, avoiding direct contact between air and fuel. It is basically an unmixed combustion process (fuel and air are never mixed) whose flue gases are mainly CO2 and steam. Thus, after condensation, the carbon dioxide can be easily separated from the exhaust.SINTEF Energy Research and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) have designed a 150kWth second generation chemical looping combustion reactor system. It consists of a double loop circulating fluidized bed (DLCFB) reactor system where both the air reactor and the fuel reactor are Circulating Fluidized Beds (CFB) meant to work in the fast fluidization regime and interconnected by divided loop-seals and a bottom extraction to achieve high solids circulation and be flexible in operation. The main purpose of this project is to be strongly industrial oriented in order to make the step from lab-scale to industrial application easier. A Cold Flow Model (CFM) has been built to verify the design of the CLC reactor system.CFM consists of two reactors, the fuel and the air reactor, with different diameters, each one having a loop seal . No chemical reaction happens inside the CFM, because its main goal is to have the understanding of the hydrodynamics of the system.An experimental campaign was performed in order to find the best conditions for the solid flux, reaching stability, and the proper flow regimes for the coupled reactors in the CFM. An investigation and mapping of the operating area of the coupled reactors was the target of the experiments.As the first step and for further research, the best set of operating conditions is selected by considering the stability and solid flux in order to meet the design targets. This experiment is used as the reference case and later all other operational modes in the cold flow model which resembles CLC are evaluated against the base data obtained.Different operational modes of Chemical Looping Combustion were designed by means of the CFM to validate the CLC reactor system design. A significant effort was done to reach part-load , maximum power , maximum fuel reactor concentration and reforming to define the best operational window. In each of the mentioned experiments pressure profiles and concentration of the solids are compared to the reference case of the CFM.As long as the loop seal plays a key role in the operation of the CFB, for assuring the solids movement in an endless loop, series of experiments were performed in the CFM in order to map the operational window of the loop seal. The sensitivity of the loop seal is evaluated by pressure difference in the bottom of the fuel reactor and air reactor during the operation of the CFM to obtain an operational window for the loop seal. For the last step, the effects of the total mass inventory circulating in the system for five different operational modes were investigated by increasing and decreasing the inventory. For each case the pressure profiles and concentration of the solids is compared with the reference case and the results are shown in this thesis work.

SINTEF and NTNU are planning to build a 150 kWth Chemical Looping Combustion (CLC) reactor system. This is new technology and the CLC reactor system is going to be one of the largest of its kind in the world. The technology is promising for CO2 capture in terms of energy efficiency and economics. To verify the design a Cold Flow Model, CFM, has been built. In the CFM no reactions take place, but it simulates the hydrodynamics of the 150 kWth CLC reactor system. The reactor system consists of two reactors exchanging solids in a loop. The two reactors are one air reactor, AR, and one fuel reactor, FR. Air is injected at different locations in the CFM to fluidize the solids and achieve the proper mass flows. The Cold Flow Model has been commissioned and an experimental campaign was executed. A series of experiments running each reactor singularly were performed. The rig seems to be functioning satisfactory and a minimum of plugging in the pipes were observed. The Cold Flow model has two cyclones that showed collection efficiencies at approximately 99 %. This is important to avoid emissions of solids from the future CLC reactor system, both for economic and environmental reasons. An investigation and mapping of the operating area of the reactors singularly and coupled was the target of the experiments. Correlations between operating velocity, total solid inventory, air distribution and flux were found. Appropriate flow regimes, meant to give good gas solid contact efficiency, and mass flow’s entrainments were achieved. The targets of a solid circulation rate of 2 kg/s in the AR and 1 kg/s in the FR were also achieved. Air is injected in the bottom of the reactors to fluidize the particles. This air is distributed through primary and secondary nozzles. The highest primary air percentage tested in the FR, 75%, gave the highest flux. In the AR 100% was tested, but 70% gave the highest flux. The last result is in contradiction with other experimental work in the area which says that 100% primary air should give the highest flux. After the mapping of the operating area of the single reactors it was possible to try to run the two reactors coupled. The divided loop seal was tested but led to a pressure short circuit and a large amount of the total solid inventory was lost out of the cyclones in a short time. The operation of a divided loop seal is probably possible, but seems difficult. The internal part of the loop seals were sealed to make the operation easier. The loop seals could then be operated as traditional loop seals. A challenge was the mass balance between the fuel reactor and air reactor. The mass flows of particles from both reactors must be equal to have a mass balance. Otherwise all the particles eventually ends up in one reactor. Results from the single reactor experiments were used to know approximately which operating conditions gave a mass balance between the reactors. The Cold Flow Model seemed to a certain degree be self regulating for achieving a mass balance if initial operating conditions were reasonable. Two experiments with coupled reactors and mass exchange only through the loop seals were done. A global solid circulation rate of 0.7 kg/s and 1 kg/s was achieved. Both AR and FR had the proper flow regimes. Proper flow regimes in the reactors are turbulent or fast fluidization. A third experiment utilized a lifter to enhance the solid transport between the reactors. A lifter is a additional transporter of solids from one reactor to another. The lifter worked successfully. The experiment had a global solid circulation rate of 1.4 kg/s. The mass flows were 1.4 kg/s from the AR loop seal and 1 kg/s from the FR loop seal. The remaining part 0.4 kg/s from the FR to the AR was transported with the lifter. Both reactors had proper flow regimes. A fourth experiment trying to achieve a global solid circulation rate of 2 kg/s failed. The bottleneck seems to be the AR loop seal. Solids accumulated and the loop seal was not able to handle this rate of solid flow. A new operation philosophy and design of the loop seal has been proposed. The new design of the loop seal and operation philosophy reduces the air flow needed in the loop seal, but it may not necessarily solve the solid circulation limit in the AR loop seal. Further investigation is needed. Manipulating the pressure in the AR may contribute to enhance the rate of solid flow through the loop seal. The successful experiments were presented at the 1st International Conference on Chemical Looping, IFP-Lyon, France, 17 - 19 March 2010. After the experimental campaign was finished the experiments were simulated with the fluidization software ERGUN developed by Compiegne University of Technology. ERGUN applies different mathematical models. For the simulations performed Horio’s and Berruti’s model were applied. The evaluation of the ERGUN simulations by means of the experiments shows that Horio’s and Berruti’s model should not be used for a detailed investigation of the flow structure in the CFM’s risers. However, despite its strongly empirical nature, a preliminary investigation of the riser’s behavior with Berruti’s model may be useful. Berruti’s model is a reasonable tool for modeling the upper part of the pressure profile in the AR and FR at the operating conditions tested. The operating conditions tested in the AR are total solid inventories of 35 and 45 kg, and superficial gas velocities from 0.9-1.9 m/s. The operating conditions tested in the FR are total solid inventories of 35 and 50 kg, and superficial gas velocities from 1.5-2.0 m/s. Berruti’s model is not capable of accounting for the dense bed in the lower part of the reactor as Horio’s model does. However, Horio’s model mismatched the experimental results too much. Horio’s model seems to be a provide a better match at larger total solid inventory and smaller operating velocities, hence flow regimes not relevant for the CLC reactor system.