Industrial Heat - a CO2 challenge - Journey to Zero Carbon

For most people a discussion of CO2 emissions either means getting into the details of coal fired power plants and renewables or the benefits of electric vehicles over the internal combustion engine. Two reports produced for the Sixth Innovation for Cool Earth Forum (1,2) highlight that 10% of global CO2 emissions come from high temperature fossil fuel based industrial processes where coal or gas is used to produce the heat input required for chemical conversions and transformations. These industrial processes include those used to produce key commodities such as steel, glass and ceramics, cement, ammonia and methanol. All of these products are obviously important for advanced economies and as the reports highlight there is currently no obvious low carbon replacements, capable of generating the temperatures and/or the heat flux required by the processes.

Fortunately there are potential pathways – all of which require significant R&D and equipment modification – to reduce emissions from these Industrial processes. The most promising approaches include :

Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) – keep using fossil fuels and collect the CO2 that is currently being emitted to the atmosphere
Hydrogen – produced either from methane with CCS to make it a low carbon fuel or the electrolysis of water using electricity from renewables to make a zero carbon fuel
Biomass and Biodiesel – wood, cellulose and fats (currently mostly waste products) either used directly or converted to flammable liquids.
Advanced nuclear – high temperature water from nuclear power plants
Electricity – would require significant retrofitting and process design/modification to allow direct or indirect electrical heating

To help my readers work through this issue in more detail, they are referred to the third link provided below (3) – a summary of the two very detailed reports. This summary does a pretty good job distilling the key points for those who may want a shorthand version of the topic. One interesting point to note in the VOX analysis is the preference the author gives to making zero carbon electricity so plentiful and cheap that this becomes the preferred solution. While there is some logic to this conclusion it is also symptomatic of a “renewables first” approach. While the author acknowledges the potential need for CCS, hydrogen (preferably made via electrolysis) and nuclear, the idea of promoting solutions that are alternatives to and run in parallel with renewables is not something that sits comfortably.