Exploiting the temporal characteristics of tidal stream power for green ammonia production

Abstract

Green ammonia, a promising zero-carbon energy storage vector, has never been produced using solely tidal stream energy despite its predictable characteristics. Combining tidal stream sites with a phase difference (tidal phasing) facilitates anticorrelation between these sites’ power profiles, enabling a more consistent power output. Green ammonia production benefits from a steady and predictable power input. The objective of this paper is to determine if nearby tidal sites have a large enough phase difference (anticorrelation) to reduce the cost of ammonia production. Moreover, producing green ammonia from underutilized or unutilized remote and grid-constrained tidal stream sites may enable viability of these sites. This paper is the first analysis of green ammonia production using solely tidal stream energy and the first analysis of tidal phasing for green fuel production. Two UK case studies are presented in i) the North Channel of the Irish Sea and ii) Orkney. There are tidal sites in each which have a phase difference (e.g. the Mull of Kintyre/Sound of Islay, and Graemsay/North Ronaldsay with correlation coefficients of 0.17 and −0.02 respectively), utilising this phase difference reduces the levelized cost of ammonia by 8% in the Irish Sea and by 12% in Orkney.