Driving Innovation in Four Key Domains
Hydrogen Production and Storage
Hydrogen is a clean energy source that holds the potential to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels. However, producing more sustainable forms of hydrogen – such as green, yellow or pink hydrogen – is a challenge. At the Electrification Institute, we focus on developing methods like electrolysis, which uses renewable electricity to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, as well as plasma-based cracking of methane or ammonia for electrified hydrogen production. This hydrogen can be used to power long-haul transportation, fuel industries, or even store excess renewable energy.
One of the key challenges is the storage of hydrogen, which currently requires costly methods like high-pressure cylinders or cryogenic tanks. Our research aims to find more efficient, sustainable ways to produce and store hydrogen, making it a viable solution for a greener future. We believe storage of hydrogen in carriers such as ammonia and methanol provide interesting use cases.
Carbon Recycling
While the energy sector should be fully decarbonized by the use of renewable electricity, the chemical industry will always rely on carbon to be embedded in the materials we use on a daily basis. In order to defossilize the embedded carbon, we should address alternative carbon sources.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are one of the biggest contributors to climate change. At the Electrification Institute, we are working on innovative carbon capture and utilization (CCU) technologies. This involves capturing CO2 from industrial processes and turning it into valuable products, like fuels or chemicals, rather than releasing it into the atmosphere. By finding ways to recycle CO2, we aim to close the carbon cycle and move closer to a circular economy, where waste is minimized, and resources are reused. Our work supports global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and transition to a more sustainable future.
Other sustainable carbon sources such as biomethane (CH4) and used plastics can also be converted into the building blocks of a clean chemical industry.
Sustainable Ammonia Production
Ammonia plays a key role in producing fertilizers and is now gaining attention for its potential in green energy. Traditional ammonia production relies on fossil fuels, but at the Electrification Institute, we are exploring how to make ammonia production 100% carbon-free. This involves combining green hydrogen –and nitrogen from the air in novel processes driven by plasma- and electrochemistry
Not only can green ammonia serve as an important fertilizer, but it also offers promising solutions for energy storage and as a zero-carbon fuel for industries like shipping. This technology could be a big step toward reducing global carbon emissions.
In addition to ammonia, nitric acid (NOx) is also a viable option for green fertilizer production, which is also being studied at the Electrification Institute.
Reactor Design and Prototyping
At the Electrification Institute, we specialize in designing and prototyping advanced chemical reactors that use electrical energy. These reactors are crucial for improving the efficiency of industrial processes. By leveraging innovative techniques like induction heating and electrical fields, in electrochemical and plasma reactors, we help companies scale up these technologies for real-world use.
Our focus is on making processes more energy-efficient and adaptable to renewable energy sources. This helps industries reduce their carbon footprint and better manage the variability of renewable power sources, ensuring smoother, more sustainable operations.
Our reactor designs are not just based on trial-and-error, but we use fully coupled, self-consistent computational fluid dynamics simulations (developed in-house), to predict reactor design improvements.