Thermodynamic potential of a novel plasma-assisted sustainable process for co-production of ammonia and hydrogen with liquid metals

Sarafraz, M.M.; Tran, Nam Nghiep; Pourali, Nima; Rebrov, E.V.; Hessel, Volker

doi:10.1016/j.enconman.2020.112709

Cited by 23 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 64 publications

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“…[24,[37][38][39][40] While they seem to be on the way to give an economic pathway to nitric acid as platform material for fertilizers recent plasma technologies did not manage to produce truly green and affordable ammonia. [41][42][43] Having both ammonia and nitric acid would open the full N-based fertilizer plethora from urea, ammonium nitrate, potassium nitrate, and so on.…”

Section: National Drivers Of Local Fertilizer Economy: the Australian Situationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tri‐fold process integration leveraging high‐ and low‐temperature plasmas: From biomass to fertilizers with local energy and for local use

Sarafraz

Tran

Nguyen

et al. 2021

J Adv Manuf & Process

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In the present study, a series of thermochemical equilibrium modeling was conducted to assess the thermodynamic potential of biomass conversion to ammonia using thermal and nonthermal plasma at small‐ and large‐scale production. The system was designed and evaluated for five different locations in Australia including the Northern Territory, South Australia, Western Australia, and New South Wales using local biomass feedstock. The equilibrium modeling showed that the pathway of biomass to biomethane using an anaerobic digestion reactor, biomethane to hydrogen using a thermal plasma reactor, followed by conversion of hydrogen to ammonia via a nonthermal plasma reactor is a plausible route, by which the exergy efficiency of the process can be as high as ~60%. It is identified that the thermal plasma reactor required two distinct zones at 3000°C < T < 4000°C and 1500°C < T < 2500°C. The first zone aims at converting electric energy into very high temperature thermal flow while the second one enables to split methane molecules into solid carbon and hydrogen. The new ammonia process is also assessed from the viewpoint of the current industrial transformation, being accelerated by the post‐COVID economy, which moves toward local, resilient, integrated and self‐sufficient production under the umbrella of an emerging fractal economy. With respect to local production, the developed process is designed for a quick response to farm use and on‐time production in view of the demands of modern ICT‐sensor based precision agriculture. The proposed process was found to be flexible (“resilient”) against production scale, geographical location, price and type of feedstock, and source of renewable energy. The system was found to be flexible against different feedstock such as spent grape marc, mustard seed, bagasse, piggery and poultry. The system can be self‐sustained up to ~80% at T = 3500°C; with the thermal plasma reactor‐zone 2 producing the electricity requirements for the nonthermal plasma via a steam turbine power block. Finally, the system it is investigated to which degree the system is adaptable to local production, self‐sufficient, and circulatory.

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Section: National Drivers Of Local Fertilizer Economy: the Australian Situationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tri‐fold process integration leveraging high‐ and low‐temperature plasmas: From biomass to fertilizers with local energy and for local use

Sarafraz

Tran

Nguyen

et al. 2021

J Adv Manuf & Process

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“…Sarafraz et al [37] carried out a thermochemical equilibrium analysis to assess the feasibility and the thermodynamic potential of a process for the coproduction of hydrogen and ammonia, by using liquid metal and a plasma reactor. The process takes advantage of a chemical looping system, liquid metal gallium drives the nitrogen fixation reaction, by using three reactors: R1 to produce gallium nitride from gallium and nitrogen, R2 to produce ammonia and hydrogen from gallium nitride and plasma reactor R3 to convert gallium oxide to pure gallium ( Figure 8).…”

Section: Reactor Configurationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… Schematic diagram of the process for the coproduction of ammonia and hydrogen using a plasma-assisted process [ 37 ]. Reproduced with permission from M.M.…”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

A Review about the Recent Advances in Selected NonThermal Plasma Assisted Solid–Gas Phase Chemical Processes

et al. 2020

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Plasma science has attracted the interest of researchers in various disciplines since the 1990s. This continuously evolving field has spawned investigations into several applications, including industrial sterilization, pollution control, polymer science, food safety and biomedicine. nonthermal plasma (NTP) can promote the occurrence of chemical reactions in a lower operating temperature range, condition in which, in a conventional process, a catalyst is generally not active. The aim, when using NTP, is to selectively transfer electrical energy to the electrons, generating free radicals through collisions and promoting the desired chemical changes without spending energy in heating the system. Therefore, NTP can be used in various fields, such as NOx removal from exhaust gases, soot removal from diesel engine exhaust, volatile organic compound (VOC) decomposition, industrial applications, such as ammonia production or methanation reaction (Sabatier reaction). The combination of NTP technology with catalysts is a promising option to improve selectivity and efficiency in some chemical processes. In this review, recent advances in selected nonthermal plasma assisted solid–gas processes are introduced, and the attention was mainly focused on the use of the dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) reactors.

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“…Data on steam methane reforming, − thermal plasma methane pyrolysis, − and water electrolysis to produce H 2 − were collected from the literature review. We also introduced in this article an oxygen credit of $1/kg of O 2 in case water electrolysis is applied for H 2 production, while a carbon credit of $1/kg carbon black (CB) will also be given to the scenarios where thermal plasma methane pyrolysis is used to produce turquoise hydrogen. − The price for $1/kg is conservative as typical carbon black prices are above $1.3/kg. Detailed information about cost analysis of hydrogen, nitrogen, and ammonia production is provided in Tables S3–S7 of the Supporting Information.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Economic Optimization of Local Australian Ammonia Production Using Plasma Technologies with Green/Turquoise Hydrogen

Tran

Tejada

Asrami

et al. 2021

ACS Sustainable Chem. Eng.

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Growing concern about the supply of goods under the COVID pandemic due to border restrictions and community lockdown has made us aware of the limitations of the global supply chain. Fertilizers are pivotal for the growth and welfare of humankind, and there is more than a century of history in industrial technology. Ammonia is the key platform chemical here which can be chemically diversified to all kinds of fertilizers. This article puts a perspective on production technologies that can enable a supply of ammonia locally and on-demand in Australia, for the farmers to produce resilient and self-sustained fertilizers. To assess the validity of such a new business model, multiobjective optimization has to be undergone, and computing is the solution to rank the millions of possible solutions. In this lieu, an economic optimization framework for the Australian ammonia supply chain is presented. The model seeks to address the economic potential of distributed ammonia plants across Australia. Different techniques for hydrogen and related ammonia production such as thermal plasma, nonthermal plasma, and electrolysis (all typifying technology disruption), and mini Haber–Bosch (typifying scale disruption) are benchmarked to the central mega plant on a world-scale using conventional technology, verifying that “Moore’s Law” (Mack, C. A. IEEE Trans. 2011, 24 (2), 202–207) of growing bigger and bigger is not the only path to sustainable agriculture. Results show that ammonia can be produced at $317/ton at a regional scale using thermal plasma hydrogen generation which could be competitive to the conventional production model, if credit in terms of lead time and carbon footprint could be taken into account.

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Thermodynamic potential of a novel plasma-assisted sustainable process for co-production of ammonia and hydrogen with liquid metals

Abstract: Please refer to published version for the most recent bibliographic citation information. If a published version is known of, the repository item page linked to above, will contain details on accessing it.

Cited by 23 publications

References 64 publications

Tri‐fold process integration leveraging high‐ and low‐temperature plasmas: From biomass to fertilizers with local energy and for local use

Tri‐fold process integration leveraging high‐ and low‐temperature plasmas: From biomass to fertilizers with local energy and for local use

A Review about the Recent Advances in Selected NonThermal Plasma Assisted Solid–Gas Phase Chemical Processes

Economic Optimization of Local Australian Ammonia Production Using Plasma Technologies with Green/Turquoise Hydrogen

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