Techno-Economic Assessments of Power-to-Methanol Processes

The importance of methanol as a basic building block of the chemical industry, and thus many downstream products, and as a means of chemical energy storage will steadily increase in the upcoming decades. Therefore, the development of sustainable processes for the production of renewable methanol is of particular interest. With the aid of renewable electricity and through the coupling of a proton-conducting steam electrolyser (H-SOEC) for the generation of highly purified hydrogen with a heterogeneously catalysed direct synthesis of methanol from anthropogenic CO2, an attractive pathway for the production of this liquid energy carrier can be provided.

To enable an efficient and economic application of these so-called power-to-methanol processes, high system efficiencies as well as suitable concepts for system and heat integration for alternating operating conditions are of particular importance. Valuable predictions of the respective operational behaviour under stationary and transient conditions and the derivation of appropriate process data for subsequent technical and economic analyses can be provided through methods of process modelling and simulation of steam electrolysers and power-to-methanol systems.

Fields of work:

• scale-independent modelling and simulation of power-to-methanol processes and their respective single processes (2D/3D FEM, dynamic systems)
• transient modelling and simulation of the coupled mass, heat and charge transfer inside high temperature electrolysis cells
• transient and real-time capable system modelling and simulation of closely coupled power-to-methanol systems with particular focus on process control
• techno-economic assessments for renewable production environments

Publications

• Fogel, S.; Kryk, H.; Hampel, U.
  Simulation of the transient behavior of tubular solid oxide electrolyzer cells under fast load variations
  International Journal of Hydrogen Energy 44 (18), 9188–9202, (2019), DOI: 10.1016/j.ijhydene.2019.02.063
• Fogel, S.; Unger, S.; Hampel, U.
  Dynamic system modeling and simulation of a power-to-methanol process based on proton-conducting tubular solid oxide cells
  Energy Conversion and Management (300), 117970, (2024), DOI: 10.1016/j.enconman.2023.117970
• Fogel, S.; Unger, S.; Hampel, U.
  Operating windows and techno-economics of a power-to-methanol process utilizing proton-conducting high temperature electrolyzers
  Journal of CO2 Utilization (82), 102758, (2024), DOI: 10.1016/j.jcou.2024.102758
• Fogel, S.; Unger, S.; Hampel, U.
  P2M systems based on proton-conducting solid oxide cells: Future prospects and costs of renewable methanol production
  Energy Conversion and Management: X (32), 100666, (2024), DOI: 10.1016/j.ecmx.2024.100666