Power to Liquids Research Facility

在法律规定的时间范围内实现气候目标将取决于对能源的生产和使用进行脱碳，能源约占人为排放的三分之二。为了实现《巴黎协定》和可持续发展目标，能源供应需要在2050年之前完全脱碳，如果不是在此之前的话。这种从以化石燃料为基础的经济转型将需要处理可再生能源间歇性的机制，例如电池或超级电容器中的存储。然而，这两种技术在能量密度上都是有限的，而且会引起对关键矿物的争夺，这使得它们无法负担更长时间的任务应用。一种更具可伸缩性的方法是，通过电解水(电能转化为氢气)，将多余的能量用于生产氢气作为能量矢量。英国氢战略提出了一种发展氢经济的全系统方法，将其作为实现净零目标的关键推动因素，并主要关注能源系统中氢的使用。然而，绿色氢气也将在燃料和化学品生产脱碳的重要任务中发挥关键作用。为了减少排放，化学品部门必须开始使用地上碳的来源(例如生物质、二氧化碳)，但这也带来了一系列独特的挑战。这些可持续的原料在组成上与化石燃料非常不同，富含氧气和贫氢，需要开发新的途径来获得历史上从原油中提取的高价值产品。一种方法是通过与绿色氢的反应来缓解原料氢短缺，这使得燃料和化学品生产能够电气化。通常被称为Power-to-Liques(或Power-to-X)，这种可持续的化学品路线有可能创造碳中性甚至碳负过程，如果生物来源的二氧化碳能够有效地从自然碳循环中去除的话。以我们在能量储存、电解槽技术和工业流程开发方面的核心专业知识为基础，我们的目标是建立一个液体动力研究设施。这一独特的设施将使仅使用水、废气和空气成分(氮气和二氧化碳)作为原料的能源、燃料和化学品的脱碳生产研究处于世界领先地位。该设施将建立在基础研究的基础上，利用旨在加速技术开发的最先进的基础设施。使用多个固定床反应器系统的高通量实验将为发现阶段研发提供基石。第一阶段确定的候选催化剂和工艺条件将在第二系统中进一步优化，该系统能够探索电解和化学转化步骤之间的集成。常见的可储存分子的合成过程是放热的，而电解本质上是强吸热的。这些过程在热和化学上的紧密耦合提供了解锁整个系统效率的根本提高，这将扩大宝贵的可再生资源的脱碳影响。通过与苏格兰国家制造研究所(NMI)的密切合作，最新的先进制造研究将被应用于开发新的集成子系统，这些子系统可以通过批量生产快速扩大规模，从而实现关键的脱碳目标。

Achieving climate targets within legislated timescales will be predicated on decarbonizing the production and use of energy, responsible for approximately two thirds of anthropogenic emissions. To meet the Paris Agreement and Sustainable Development goals, energy supply would need to fully decarbonize by 2050, if not before. This transition from a fossil fuel based economy will require mechanisms for dealing with the intermittency of renewable energy, such as storage in batteries or supercapacitors. However, both of these technologies are limited in energy density and create contention for critical minerals that make them unaffordable for longer mission applications. A more scalable approach is to use surplus energy for the production of hydrogen as an energy vector, via the electrolysis of water (Power-to-Hydrogen). The UK Hydrogen Strategy sets out a whole-systems approach to developing the hydrogen economy as a critical enabler of achieving net zero targets and is concerned primarily with the use of hydrogen in the energy system. However, green hydrogen will also play a key role in the important task of decarbonising the production of fuels and chemicals. To reduce emissions, the chemicals sector must begin to use sources of above ground carbon (e.g. biomass, carbon dioxide), but this brings its own unique set of challenges. These sustainable feedstocks are compositionally very different to fossil fuels, being rich in oxygen and lean in hydrogen, requiring the development of new routes to the high value products that have historically been derived from crude oil. One approach is to alleviate the feedstock hydrogen deficiency through reactions with green hydrogen, which enables the electrification of fuels and chemicals production. Often referred to as Power-to-Liquids (or Power-to-X), this sustainable route to chemicals has the potential for creating carbon neutral or even carbon negative processes if biogenic carbon dioxide can be removed efficiently from the natural carbon cycle. Building on our core expertise in energy storage, electrolyser technology and industrial process development our aim is to establish a Power-to-Liquids research facility. This unique facility will enable world-leading research into decarbonising the production of energy, fuels and chemicals using only water, waste streams and components of air (nitrogen and carbon dioxide) as feedstocks. The facility will be founded on fundamental research harnessing state of the art infrastructure designed to accelerate technology development. High throughput experimentation, using multiple fixed-bed reactor systems, will provide the cornerstone of discovery phase R&D. Catalyst candidates and process conditions identified in this first stage will be further optimised in a second system that enables exploration of the integration between electrolysis and chemical transformation steps. Synthesis processes for common storable molecules are exothermic, while electrolysis is inherently strongly endothermic. Close coupling of these processes both thermally and chemically offers to unlock radical increases in whole system efficiency that will extend the decarbonising impact of precious renewable resources. Through close collaboration with the National Manufacturing Institute of Scotland (NMIS), the latest advanced manufacturing research will be applied to developing new integrated subsystems that can be rapidly scaled by volume manufacturing so that critical decarbonisation targets can be met.