Company makes strides in solar hydrogen project
By Paul Hanley
Jan 24, 2006
A demonstration project that aims to make environmentally-friendly hydrogen from the environmentally-damaging methane produced in Regina's landfill is the latest project for Saskatoon's Solar Hydrogen Energy Corporation (SHEC Labs).
In 1996, SHEC Labs began developing technologies to produce hydrogen using solar energy. Making hydrogen with solar is a kind of Holy Grail of alternative energy and many were skeptical it could be done economically. Whether it can be remains to be seen, but SHEC's technology appears to be gaining credibility.
SHEC Station No. 1 at the Regina landfill will feature the world's first commercial-scale renewable solar hydrogen "Dry Fuel Reformation" (DFR) reactors. The project, which received the unanimous support of Regina's city council in December, will benefit from $2 million in funding from Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC), a federal foundation that supports green technologies. The facility will cost $6 million, including $1.9 million from the City of Regina.
Abundant and clean burning, hydrogen is often touted as the fuel of the future. Currently, it takes more energy to separate hydrogen from source materials like water, methane, gasoline or natural gas than burning the resulting hydrogen produces. However, if "free" solar energy can be used to strip the hydrogen from parent materials, a net energy gain would be achieved. What is more, hydrogen burns without producing greenhouse gases and air pollutants.
SHEC has found a catalyst that makes it possible to produce hydrogen at lower temperatures, which they hope will eventually make solar-powered production feasible. SHEC's consortium partners, including Giffels Associates Limited (Ingenium), a major Integrated Consulting, Design-Build, and Asset Management Company, Clean 16 Environmental Technologies Corporation, and University of Toronto Department of Chemical Engineering and Applied Chemistry, recognize the potential of the technology.
According to information on the Giffels website, the current market for hydrogen is about 42 billion kilograms per year and growing. Hydrogen is used primarily in ammonia fertilizer manufacturing, for hydrogenation in the food and beverage industry, and in petroleum refining to reduce the sulpher content of fossil fuels.
Hydrogen can also be used as a fuel. When consumed by a fuel cell, its only significant emissions are water and heat. It can also be burned directly as a fuel, and the Saskatchewan Research Council has produced the world's first hydrogen-powered trucks.
Most hydrogen is produced today by Steam Methane Reformation (SMR) of fossil fuels such as oil, coal, and natural gas, a process that releases massive amounts of carbon dioxide and other pollutants to the atmosphere. The SMR process results in a net energy loss of 30 to 35 per cent when converting methane into hydrogen, since a great deal of fossil energy or electrical power is required to operate the process.
Hydrogen is also produced by electrolysis, a process that uses electricity to convert water into hydrogen and oxygen. Although electrolysis itself can be quite efficient in converting electricity into hydrogen, the electricity used for electrolysis is often primarily generated from fossil fuels. Therefore, traditional hydrogen production methods result in a net increase in air pollution and are highly inefficient from an energy conversion perspective.
Solar hydrogen production provides a net energy gain when converting methane into hydrogen, since the energy used to drive the process is from the sun. Since SMR is not typically cost-effective at small to moderate production levels, SHEC's DFR technology is particularly attractive for smaller and distributed hydrogen production, such as the project proposed for Regina.
Tom Beck, President and CEO of SHEC Labs, says SHEC Station No. 1 in Regina will have the capacity to produce 1.2 million kg of renewable hydrogen per year and will prevent 81.1 kt of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions from entering the atmosphere every year for over 40 years.
SHEC reports that a prototype solar hydrogen generator it has operated for about 1,200 hours has had no noticeable coking or degradation of the catalysts. Hydrogen production is near the theoretical maximum at about 66 per cent in the product gas stream with a 98.2 per cent mol conversion of the feed methane.
For more on SHEC's technology visit www.shec-labs.com