Abstract
Fossil fuels depletion and increasing environmental impacts arising from their use call for seeking growing supplies from renewable and nuclear primary energy sources. However, it is necessary to simultaneously attend to both the electrical power needs and the specificities of the transport and industrial sector requirements. A major question posed by the shift away from traditional fossil fuels towards renewable energy sources lies in matching the power demand with the daily and seasonal oscillation and the intermittency of these natural energy fluxes. Huge energy storage requirements become necessary or otherwise the decline of the power factor of both the renewable and conventional generation would mean loss of resources. On the other hand, liquid and gaseous fuels, for which there is vast storage and distribution capacity available, appear essential to supply the transport sector for a very long time ahead, besides their domestic and industrial roles. Within this context, the present assessment suggests that proven technologies and sound tested principles are available to develop an integrated energy system, relying on synthetic fuels. These would incorporate carbon capture and utilization in a closed carbon cycle, progressively relying mostly on solar and/or nuclear primary sources, providing both electric power and gaseous/liquid hydrocarbon fuels, having ample storage capacity, and able to timely satisfy all forms of energy demand. The principles and means are already available to develop a carbon-neutral synthetic fuel economy.
Highlights
In 1950, 30 percent of the world’s population was urban, but growing fast from 746 million in 1950 to 3.9 billion in 2014, its share being projected to attain 66% by 2050
The idea of capturing anthropogenic emitted CO2 to synthesize gaseous and liquid hydrocarbon fuels and other carbon-based chemicals arose as an approach to the carbon capture and utilization” (CCU) concept; environmental carbon together with environment derived hydrogen can be converted into high-density fuels compatible with current transportation infrastructure and needs, in processes driven by decarbonized primary energy sources
Fossil fuels depletion and increasing environmental impacts posed by their extraction call for seeking growing supplies from renewable and nuclear primary energy sources
Summary
In 1950, 30 percent of the world’s population was urban, but growing fast from 746 million in 1950 to 3.9 billion in 2014, its share being projected to attain 66% by 2050. The Power-to-Gas (PtG) and Power-to-Liquids (PtL) schemes propose the following: Capturing the excess electrical generation (given the combined overcapacity of renewable and baseload installed capacity) to be converted into gaseous or liquid carbon-neutral fuels and having these introduced into the storage, transmission, and distribution networks of such fuels. Using these fuels in power plants connected to the gas/liquid grids to assist the electrical grid as back-up, when facing higher electricity demand that cannot be met by already operating plants [7,8,9]. These sources provide data and analysis that can support independent assessments and additions to these promising schemes
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