In their Morgantown laboratories, West Virginia University researchers are in the process of developing an affordable, ample electricity supply for the nation — sourced from liquified ammonia.
John Hu, Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources chair professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering at West Virginia University, and his colleague, Chemical Engineering Professor Debangsu Bhattacharyya, have created and are refining what could be considered a liquid form of electricity.
The carbon-neutral energy source can be transported easily and could lower carbon dioxide emissions, making it economical and eco-friendly as well.
“The project was originated from a Department of Energy ARPA-E-funded program, called REFUEL, or Renewable Energy to Fuels Through Utilization of Energy-Dense Liquids,” Hu said. “WVU received an award to use a microwave catalytic process to synthesize ammonia using hydrogen H2 and nitrogen N2 that are produced from renewable electricity.
“Ammonia is a liquid energy carrier that can be transported through an available underground pipeline, then turned into electricity again,” he explained.
The Phase I award WVU obtained was implemented from April 2017 to December 2018. Promising results from their work spurred further ARPA-E support.
“Due to the success of the project, we were awarded Phase II for another two years, starting from August 2019,” Hu said.
Partnering with WVU for the Phase I portion of the project were research teams from Florida State University and a pair of federal laboratories: NETL (the Pittsburgh-headquartered National Energy Technology Laboratory, which focuses on applied research for the clean production and use of domestic energy resources) and PNNL (the Washington-state-based Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, managed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science).
Short for Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy, ARPA-E is a federal government agency that promotes and funds research and development of advanced energy technologies. The agency is providing major funding for Phase II of the project. Hu has received $1.65 million from ARPA-E over the past two years.
“The [Phase II] team consists of WVU, NETL and Shell and Malachite Technologies, who both provide cost shares to support the project,” Hu said.
The energy conversion process draws initially from solar and wind energy sources. Hu, Bhattacharyya and their research team are using electricity from solar and wind farms and converting it into liquid ammonia.
While it is primarily used commercially for fertilizer, ammonia liquefies under light pressure and chilling. From there, it can be transported — via pipelines, rails or waterways — to power plants to produce carbon-free electricity. The fuel can also be stored for extended periods of time until needed, an advantage ammonia holds over hydrogen, and, concurrently, lowering carbon emissions from the transportation sector.
Modern industrial ammonia production uses the Haber-Bosch process, developed in the early 20th century, chiefly for agricultural applications. According to an October 2019 WVU Today article written by Olivia Miller, the approach of the WVU research team uses low temperatures and pressure, producing ammonia at a smaller and more economical (and profitable) scale than the Haber-Bosch process demands.
“The success of the technology development can benefit not only the ammonia industry, but also other industries where small-scale distributed production mode is required,” Hu said in the article.
He noted that “liquid electricity” is somewhat a misnomer for the process being developed.
“Liquid electricity is actually liquid ammonia, that can be transported through pipelines,” Hu said. “Then, when it reaches the destination, ammonia can be converted to electricity by fuel cell or gas turbine. Originally, this program targeted renewable electricity — wind and solar power — that is stranded on the West Coast due to demand/supply issues and the intermittent nature of renewable electricity.
“If this stranded electricity is transmitted to the East Coast, it will be a huge economic benefit,” Hu said. “However, the infrastructure of power transmission — the power grid — from the West Coast to the East Coast is not enough to transmit these stranded electricity. The technology is to convert this electricity into an energy carrier that can be transported through underground pipelines which are under-utilized, and, later on, turn the liquid energy carrier back to electricity.”
Hu said the technology could, eventually, become feasible on a worldwide scale.
“Our technology is not limited to the West Coast,” he said. “It is applicable to any stranded electricity, locally and globally.
“Our technology is also applicable to the utilization of stranded gas. It has local and global implications.
“We are solving engineering scale-up challenges and trying to demonstrate process intensification — more productivity per unit operation — for modular production. It may take five years for commercial deployment,” Hu said.
The WVU Center for Innovation in Gas Utilization in Research is also providing support for the research.
The team is also performing research on natural gas conversion to value-added liquid chemicals, natural gas conversion to H2 and solid carbon nanomaterials, and coal-to-carbon fibers, Hu said.
“We are working on natural gas-biomass co-processing to produce high-value chemicals and CO2 and natural gas conversion to value-added chemicals.
“All of these research projects are centered on the utilization of abundant energy resources in the state of West Virginia — natural gas, biomass and coal,” Hu said. “We are also partnering with several technology developers for accelerated commercialization of CO2 capture technologies that can reduce the penalty for CO2 capture significantly,” Bhattacharyya said.
Bhattacharyya added that research is also underway in the WVU labs to improve the reliability, availability and efficiency of fossil-fired power plants by leveraging mathematical approaches with artificial intelligence.
“We are also doing systems level analysis and optimization of energy storage technologies, which is critical as renewable penetration to the grid keeps increasing,” Bhattacharyya said.
He said the researchers are also working on optimal synthesis of CO2 utilization technologies for value-added chemicals.
John Hu, Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources chair professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering at West Virginia University, and his colleague, Chemical Engineering Professor Debangsu Bhattacharyya, have created and are refining what could be considered a liquid form of electricity.
The carbon-neutral energy source can be transported easily and could lower carbon dioxide emissions, making it economical and eco-friendly as well.
“The project was originated from a Department of Energy ARPA-E-funded program, called REFUEL, or Renewable Energy to Fuels Through Utilization of Energy-Dense Liquids,” Hu said. “WVU received an award to use a microwave catalytic process to synthesize ammonia using hydrogen H2 and nitrogen N2 that are produced from renewable electricity.
“Ammonia is a liquid energy carrier that can be transported through an available underground pipeline, then turned into electricity again,” he explained.
The Phase I award WVU obtained was implemented from April 2017 to December 2018. Promising results from their work spurred further ARPA-E support.
“Due to the success of the project, we were awarded Phase II for another two years, starting from August 2019,” Hu said.
Partnering with WVU for the Phase I portion of the project were research teams from Florida State University and a pair of federal laboratories: NETL (the Pittsburgh-headquartered National Energy Technology Laboratory, which focuses on applied research for the clean production and use of domestic energy resources) and PNNL (the Washington-state-based Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, managed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science).
Short for Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy, ARPA-E is a federal government agency that promotes and funds research and development of advanced energy technologies. The agency is providing major funding for Phase II of the project. Hu has received $1.65 million from ARPA-E over the past two years.
“The [Phase II] team consists of WVU, NETL and Shell and Malachite Technologies, who both provide cost shares to support the project,” Hu said.
The energy conversion process draws initially from solar and wind energy sources. Hu, Bhattacharyya and their research team are using electricity from solar and wind farms and converting it into liquid ammonia.
While it is primarily used commercially for fertilizer, ammonia liquefies under light pressure and chilling. From there, it can be transported — via pipelines, rails or waterways — to power plants to produce carbon-free electricity. The fuel can also be stored for extended periods of time until needed, an advantage ammonia holds over hydrogen, and, concurrently, lowering carbon emissions from the transportation sector.
Modern industrial ammonia production uses the Haber-Bosch process, developed in the early 20th century, chiefly for agricultural applications. According to an October 2019 WVU Today article written by Olivia Miller, the approach of the WVU research team uses low temperatures and pressure, producing ammonia at a smaller and more economical (and profitable) scale than the Haber-Bosch process demands.
“The success of the technology development can benefit not only the ammonia industry, but also other industries where small-scale distributed production mode is required,” Hu said in the article.
He noted that “liquid electricity” is somewhat a misnomer for the process being developed.
“Liquid electricity is actually liquid ammonia, that can be transported through pipelines,” Hu said. “Then, when it reaches the destination, ammonia can be converted to electricity by fuel cell or gas turbine. Originally, this program targeted renewable electricity — wind and solar power — that is stranded on the West Coast due to demand/supply issues and the intermittent nature of renewable electricity.
“If this stranded electricity is transmitted to the East Coast, it will be a huge economic benefit,” Hu said. “However, the infrastructure of power transmission — the power grid — from the West Coast to the East Coast is not enough to transmit these stranded electricity. The technology is to convert this electricity into an energy carrier that can be transported through underground pipelines which are under-utilized, and, later on, turn the liquid energy carrier back to electricity.”
Hu said the technology could, eventually, become feasible on a worldwide scale.
“Our technology is not limited to the West Coast,” he said. “It is applicable to any stranded electricity, locally and globally.
“Our technology is also applicable to the utilization of stranded gas. It has local and global implications.
“We are solving engineering scale-up challenges and trying to demonstrate process intensification — more productivity per unit operation — for modular production. It may take five years for commercial deployment,” Hu said.
The WVU Center for Innovation in Gas Utilization in Research is also providing support for the research.
The team is also performing research on natural gas conversion to value-added liquid chemicals, natural gas conversion to H2 and solid carbon nanomaterials, and coal-to-carbon fibers, Hu said.
“We are working on natural gas-biomass co-processing to produce high-value chemicals and CO2 and natural gas conversion to value-added chemicals.
“All of these research projects are centered on the utilization of abundant energy resources in the state of West Virginia — natural gas, biomass and coal,” Hu said. “We are also partnering with several technology developers for accelerated commercialization of CO2 capture technologies that can reduce the penalty for CO2 capture significantly,” Bhattacharyya said.
Bhattacharyya added that research is also underway in the WVU labs to improve the reliability, availability and efficiency of fossil-fired power plants by leveraging mathematical approaches with artificial intelligence.
“We are also doing systems level analysis and optimization of energy storage technologies, which is critical as renewable penetration to the grid keeps increasing,” Bhattacharyya said.
He said the researchers are also working on optimal synthesis of CO2 utilization technologies for value-added chemicals.
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