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The modern world is currently facing the energy revolution due to the decarbonisation challenges, promoted by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The well-established fossil fuel energy sources are being pushed from their leading market positions by renewable energy. European governments are some of the first to take decisive action towards decarbonisation and have already started reforming their economic sectors. New questions arising from such changes are influencing the role of Russia in supplying energy to the European market. The development of a market for renewable gas, especially renewable hydrogen in Europe, could potentially, in a long-term scenario up to 2050, be an option for Russia to help maintain demand and remain in the role as a main exporter.
The focus of this master thesis is put on the assessment of the current state of readiness of Russian and European energy systems for integration of Power-to-Gas (PtG) systems and for development of a carbon-free hydrogen market. German internal green hydrogen production capacity cannot meet the approximate demand in 2030 and 2050. However, the presence of the unutilised power capacity from Russian nuclear and hydro power plants opens a new opportunity to generate economically attractive hydrogen in large volumes via electrolysis with low electricity costs and zero carbon dioxide footprint.
In this thesis different supply chains for hydrogen export (Russia-Germany) are constructed and, as a result, the levelised costs of hydrogen (LCOH) are calculated and analysed. Hydrogen produced in Russia and transported to Germany via maritime shipment shows that it can already be competitive to the domestically produced green hydrogen in Germany. The main compartment of the LCOH is the electricity expenditure, which the current Russian industrial tariffs can reach up to 90% of the total costs. Further reductions of the electricity price for PtG systems are recommended in order to achieve lower results for the LCOH.
The outcome of this master thesis provides an overview on the current readiness of Russian and German hydrogen infrastructure and further recommendations on how it should be adapted. Finally a 2050 roadmap for the implementation of a hydrogen market in Russia and Germany is developed.
PEM water electrolysis is a clean technology for hydrogen production. In spite of its many advantages, the costs of the conventional PEM electrolysis cell makes it commercially less competitive vis-à-vis its peers. An alternative cell design has been proposed which has up to a 25 % costs advantage over the conventional cell. In this alternative cell design, the flow channel plate which bears the most costs in the conventional cell design has been replaced with a 3-D Porous Transport Layer (PTL) structure. It has however, been observed that the conventional cell by far out performs the low cost cell at high current density operations, due to increased mass transport limitation in the later. Industrial and commercial hydrogen production efforts are focused towards high current density operation (> 3 A/cm²), so the alternative cell design must be optimized for mass transport limitation.
PEM water electrolysis is a clean technology for hydrogen production. In spite of its many advantages, the costs of the conventional PEM electrolysis cell makes it commercially less competitive vis-à-vis its peers. An alternative cell design has been proposed which has up to a 25 % costs advantage over the conventional cell. In this alternative cell design, the flow channel plate which bears the most costs in the conventional cell design has been replaced with a 3-D Porous Transport Layer (PTL) structure. It has however, been observed that the conventional cell by far out performs the low cost cell at high current density operations, due to increased mass transport limitation in the later. Industrial and commercial hydrogen production efforts are focused towards high current density operation (> 3 A/cm²), so the alternative cell design must be optimized for mass transport limitation.
This work seeks to understand the source of, and to eliminate the mass transport losses in the alternative cell design to get it performing at least as good as the conventional cell at current densities up to 5 A/cm². A 2-D non-isothermal semi-empirical fully-coupled models of both cell designs have been developed and experimentally validated. The developed validated models were then used as tools to simulate and predict the best operating conditions, design parameters and micro-structural properties of the PTL at which the mass transport issues in the alternate cell will be at its minimum, at high current densities. The models are based on a multi-physics approach in which thermodynamic, electrochemical, thermal and mass transport sub-models are coupled and solved numerically, to predict the cell polarization and individual overpotentials, as well as address heat and water management issues. The most unique aspect of this work however, is the development of own semi-empirical equations for predicting the mass transport overpotential imposed by the gas phase (bubbles) at high current densities. For the very first time, calculated polarization curves up to 5 A/cm² have been validated by own experimental data. The results show that, the temperature and pressure, water flowrate and thickness of the PTL are the critical parameters for mitigating mass transport limitation. It was found that, for the size of the cells studied (25 cm² active area each), when both cells are operating at the same temperature of 60 °C, alternative design will have a comparable performance to the conventional designed cell even at 5 A/cm² current density when; the operating pressure is ≥ 5 bar, the feed water flowrate is ≥ 0.024l/min∙cm², PTL porosity is 50 %, PTL pore size is ≥ 11 µm and PTL thickness is 0.5 mm. At these operating, design and micro-structural conditions, the predicted difference between the polarizations of both cells will be only ~10 mV at 5 A/cm² operating current density.
With the rapid growth of renewable energy sources (RES) in the power generation mix in accordance with the German energy transition policy (‘Energiewende’), fewer baseload coal power plants will be required. Future power generation will be supplied through decentralized power utilities such as off-shore wind parks and also through high operational flexibility of existing conventional coal power units. High operational flexibility means conventional power plants have to increase cyclic operations to cope with feed-ins from variable-RES such as wind and solar.
Unlike medium and peak load power plants that can react quickly to load changes and power ramps, baseload power plants are not suited for such operations. Important technical requirements for flexible operation include among others; frequent start-ups and shut-downs, a minimum downtime, shorter startup time and short operational periods. Baseload coal power plants however do not meet these requirements.
This increased cyclic mode of operation can have severe impacts on vital power plant components such as superheater and reheater tubes resulting in high temperature cyclic oxidation/corrosion especially because these plants were not designed for frequent cyclic operations. To optimize plant operations, minimize material damage and reduce operational and maintenance cost, it is therefore important to understand the oxidation and corrosion risk to plants materials associated with this flexible mode of operation.
In this context, thermochemical modeling in FactSage 6.4ᵀᴹ as well as experimental investigations were carried out. For the experimental investigations, five commercial coal boiler superheater and reheater materials, namely T91, VM12-SHC, TP347-HFG, DMV304 HCu and DMV310 N were exposed for 1000 hours under discontinuous isothermal oxidation conditions and 1000 hours thermo–cyclic oxidation conditions at a metal surface temperature of 650 °C. The synthetic corrosive flue gas consisted of a mixture of CO₂, O₂, SO₂, N₂ and H₂O. The test material samples were partly covered in fly ash to investigate the effect ash deposits on the corrosion and oxidation behavior of the test materials. After exposure metallographic analysis by means of light microscopy and scanning electron microscopy (LOM and SEM–EDS) were carried out to study the oxide morphology and micro–structural properties of the materials. The oxidation kinetics (weight change) results showed significant oxide growth rates (weight gain) under cyclic oxidation conditions especially in the martensitic alloys – T91, VM12-SHC.
Furthermore, metallographic analysis revealed severe oxide spallation in the ash covered sections of these alloys. The austenitic materials (TP374-HFG, DMV310 N) with the exception of DMV304 HCu showed good oxidation behavior with minimal oxide growth both under isothermal and thermal cyclic conditions. However, severe grain boundary attack and internal sulphidation were found in these alloys. DMV310 N showed the best corrosion and oxidation performance. The thermochemical modeling calculations supported the experimental results.
Coal consumption shares approximately 1/3 of a total global primary energy consumption, therefore this will mainly impact to global warming situation in the 21th century. For this reason, the natural resource such as coal should be processed in the most efficient way. Today, we have several combustion technologies to serve this purpose and oxy-fuel combustion is one of efficient method. In oxy-fuel technology, car-bon dioxide (CO2) will be captured in the liquid form for storaging into the ocean or injecting into the rock-sediment underground.CFD is an effective tool to analyse and approximate combustion gas species, temperature and heat transfer properties in oxy-fuel furnace. However, an insight into mathematical models for oxy-coal combustion is still restricted from many unknowns such as devolatilization rate, reaction mechanism of volatile reaction, turbulent gaseous combustion of volatile product, char heterogeneous reaction, radiation properties of gaseous mixture and heat transfer inside combustion chamber and through furnace’s wall. Therefore, this dissertation aims to study mathematical modeling of lignite combustion under oxy-fuel conditions and also create new correlations for weighted sum of gray gases (WSGG) model for predictions of radiation properties of oxy-coal gas mixture.
The oxy-fuel combustion process with subsequent CO2 storage has received attention as a promising technology for capturing CO2 from fossil fuel power plants. Recent progress in understanding pulverized coal combustion under oxy-fired conditions is attributable in part to studies performed at laboratory bench-scale. Previous investigations have underlined some significant differences between conventional air-fired and oxy-fired combustion with regard to temperature, heat flux distribution, and pollutant emissions. While most studies provide information on the impacts of O2 concentration in the feed gas, the impact of burner configuration and operating settings on oxy-coal combustion have been investigated by only a handful of studies. The present study addresses the impact of oxy-fired conditions on the chemistry and dynamics of pulverized coal flames generated by a staged feed-gas burner operating with pre-dried lignite. Investigations were carried out in a newly constructed test facility where the combustion takes place in a horizontal up-fired furnace with a rated capacity of 0.40 MWth. Since the focus of this work is on adapting oxy-fuel combustion techniques to existing furnaces, great emphasis is placed on maintaining flame temperatures and heat transfer similar to that of conventional air combustion. The strategy adopted to investigate the impacts of burner settings is divided into theoretical and experimental investigations. In the theoretical study, the combustion-related parameters are calculated based on thermodynamic balances and act as a background for the definition of some important operating settings. Non-reacting flow simulations which include the burner and part of the furnace are performed using a CFD commercial code aimed at a qualitative evaluation of feed gas distribution and swirl strength on the flow pattern formed in the near burner region. These predictions assist in the interpretation of the experimental data and in the calculation of the swirl number at the exit of the burner. During the experimental investigations, the characteristics of diffusion flames were first investigated in a parametric study to evaluate the impact of secondary swirl numbers at three levels and secondary/tertiary flow ratios on the overall combustion performance. The second part of the test program involved detailed in-flame measurements for selected flames. Measurements of local gas temperature, gas species concentrations, and radiative heat flux were performed with standard water-cooled probes with special focus on the near burner region. Theoretical and experimental studies are also carried out under air-fired conditions and used as a benchmark throughout this study. The overall O2 fraction upstream of the burner was kept at 31 vol% and was defined with basis on a similar adiabatic flame temperature as air-firing. Flame stabilization was shown to be strongly dependent on the O2 fraction of the primary stream, feed gas distribution between the secondary and tertiary registers, and strength of the secondary swirl. Type-1 flames operating at a stoichiometric ratio of 1.17 were generated under air-fired and oxy-fired conditions and investigated in detail. Detailed flow pattern and flame structure studies show evidence of radial flame stratification consistent with gradual O2 admixing to the central fuel jet. Increasing the swirl number and the secondary/tertiary flow ratio enhances the mixing of coal particles and increases the temperatures close to burner. Much lower temperatures on the flame axis are observed under oxy-fired conditions. In the same region, higher CO concentrations were also observed, possibly as a result of CO2 dissociation and/or gasification reactions by water vapor and CO2 which contribute to lower temperatures. Very low CO concentration at the furnace exit and high particle burnout indicate that oxy-fired conditions are not an obstacle to achieving a high combustion efficiency for type-1 flames. Although SO2 concentrations were higher under oxy-fired conditions, the emission rates were very similar, indicating that SO2 emissions are exclusively dependent on the sulfur content of the coal. Experimental data obtained from the parametric study and in-flame measurements suggest great potential for NO abatement through flame aerodynamics for oxy-coal combustion. The experiments demonstrate that feed gas staging in a burner is an effective technique for improving the flame stratification in fuel-rich and fuel-lean zones. In particular, a combination of high swirl and high secondary/tertiary flow ratio results in significant NO reduction.
Regular electricity access is a key element for the economic development and social welfare of rural areas. Decentralized energy generation has the advantage of using local resources, increasing employment and reducing transmission and distribution losses. Brazil is a tropical country, endowed with vast arable land, plentiful precipitation levels, and a large supply of human labour. Furthermore, it has strong regional distinctions with geographical, cultural and economical differences. Forestry and agriculture, important activities in the Brazilian economy, are dependent on local people and are deeply connected to traditions, nature and culture. Furthermore, these activities generate a significant amount of residues that could be used in conversion technologies for biomass, based on type, availability and market demand. When biomass were used to generate energy locally, community members could have business opportunities, improving local economy and life quality of individuals while diversifying the Brazilian energy matrix, which is mostly based on hydropower. Alternatives for implementing small-scale decentralized biomass schemes are dependent on the screening of the existing biomass supply chains, the implementation of adapted technologies for local conditions and the exploration of local resources. The present research carried out a detailed field work in order to evaluate the potential of Brazilian biomass in different regions. The author identified crucial needs, usual constraints and possible challenges of rural electrification and economic development in Brazil. Several case studies and social groups were investigated in the Federal States of Minas Gerais, São Paulo and Pará to identify different resource management strategies, which biomass technology was applied and the needs of the local population. It was concluded that the compaction of biomass to generate solid biofuels with uniform properties could be a cost-effective alternative for communities taking advantage of the resources available in the region to produce energy. Nevertheless, each case has to be considered on its own. It was concluded that energy supply and consumption should be addressed through integrated research. Scientific research should be focused on technological solutions for improving living standards and socio-economic development in rural areas. The implementation of new regulatory arrangements and a constant revision of the Brazilian energy policies are crucial for encouraging a national industry for renewables. It was also concluded that the cultural, geographical and socio-economic discrepancies of Brazil could involve challenges for the implementation of future projects, even when their development would provide benefits for Brazil as a whole.
In bubbling fluidized beds, bubble characteristics such as size, shape and velocity have a vital influence on the hydrodynamics of the bed and hence on its performance as a chemical reactor and/or a heat exchange unit. In many industrial applications such as lignite dryer heat transfer tubes are usually inserted to enhance the rate of heat and mass transfer and chemical conversion. However, their presence strongly influences the bubbling behavior of the beds. Therefore, reliable design and scale-up of these systems come only after fundamental understanding of the bubbling behavior is achieved. Therefore, in this research work the influences of tube bank geometries and particle size on bubble characteristics were thoroughly investigated. In this research work, both numerical and experimental studies were employed. For the experimental measurements, a new nonintrusive digital image analysis technique was developed. The technique allowed for the simultaneous measurements of bed expansion and various bubble properties. An in-house software was developed to fully automate the image acquisition and data processing procedure. For the numerical studies, the Eulerian-Eulerian two-fluid model based on the kinetic theory of granular flow was used. Though, this CFD model has been considered as a fundamental tool for modeling gas-solid fluidized beds, its quantitative validation remains insufficient for a wide range of reactor geometries and operating conditions. Therefore, in this work validation of the model using experimental measurements of bed expansion and bubble properties obtained from a pseudo-two-dimensional fluidized bed was performed. The influence of two-dimensional simulations and different modeling parameters such as the friction packing limit, drag model and solid-wall boundary conditions were investigated. The two-fluid model generally showed reasonable agreement with the experimental measurements of pressure drop, bed expansion and bubble properties in bubbling regime. However, as the gas superficial velocity is increased and the bed moved towards slugging and turbulent regimes a big deviation arose and the two-fluid model failed to predict reasonably the fluidized bed hydrodynamics for the freely bubbling bed. The mean bubble properties predicted by two-dimensional simulations were in reasonable agreement with experiments at lower superficial velocities. They deviated at higher bed height and this was more pronounced at higher gas superficial velocities. The results from three-dimensional simulations were in better agreement with the experimental measurements; however, the computational effort need was very high making them impractical for parametric studies and sensitivity analyses. It was also showed that the choice of friction packing limits, drag laws and specularity coefficients have little influence on the bubble properties. For a bubbling bed, both experimental measurements and numerical simulations showed that inserting horizontal tube banks had either no or marginal influence on the static bed pressure drop and bed expansion. On the other hand, bubble hydrodynamics were strongly influenced and controlled by the geometry of the immersed tubes. In freely bubbling fluidized beds bubble size as well as rise velocity increased with bed height and superficial velocity. In beds with immersed tubes, such general trends were completely disturbed. Tubes appeared to restrict rapidly growing bubbles. As a result the mean bubble diameter and rise velocity were lower in the vicinity of the tube banks than in the freely bubbling bed. Results from different particle sizes showed that in a freely bubbling bed increasing the mean particle size increased the bubble diameter and rise velocity as well as bed expansion. In fluidized beds with dense horizontal tubes on the other hand, the mean bubble properties were almost independent of the particle sizes.
In this thesis a micro reformer fuel cell system (µRFCS) for 300 Wel off-grid power supply, fuelled with bioethanol, was simulated, designed, developed and investigated in a test-rig. First a literature study was carried through to point out the specific characteristics of micro reforming, the most important being heat transfer, and present the systems currently under research and already on the market. As a next step, the processes of the RFCS were simulated with the commercial simulation tool CHEMCAD. This comprised thermodynamic equilibrium simulations for the separate reactions of steam reforming, water gas shift and selective methanation. It also included a simulation of the complete µRFCS with thermodynamic equilibrium for all reactors and assumed values for heat loss and fuel cell efficiency. The resulting net electrical efficiency was 24%. As a third step, a reaction pathway scheme with parallel and serial reactions for the steam reforming reaction of ethanol was simulated, developed, evaluated and proven plausible by matching the simulation to experimental results obtained in the µRFCS test rig. The equilibrium simulations were used to evaluate the catalyst screening carried through for reformer, water gas shift and selective methanation catalysts. The catalysts for the µRFCS were chosen and the optimum operating conditions determined by the screening tests. Having accomplished the simulation and design of the system, the largest proportion of this work was spent on the construction, set-up, testing and evaluation of the complete µRFCS. The focus for the evaluations lay on the reformer side of the system. The technical feasibility was demonstrated for an ethanol/water mix of 3 ml/min at S/C 3. The first tests without optimized heat and water management between the reformer system and the fuel cell system resulted in power output of around 115 Wel, at a total electrical efficiency of 31%.