Development of catalytic combustion and CO2 capture and conversion technology

Changes are needed to improve the efficiency and lower the CO2 emissions of traditional coal-fired power generation, which is the main source of global CO2 emissions. The integrated gasification fuel cell (IGFC) process, which combines coal gasification and high-temperature fuel cells, was proposed in 2017 to improve the efficiency of coal-based power generation and reduce CO2 emissions. Supported by the National Key R&D Program of China, the IGFC for near-zero CO2 emissions program was enacted with the goal of achieving near-zero CO2 emissions based on (1) catalytic combustion of the flue gas from solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) stacks and (2) CO2 conversion using solid oxide electrolysis cells (SOECs). In this work, we investigated a kW-level catalytic combustion burner and SOEC stack, evaluated the electrochemical performance of the SOEC stack in H2O electrolysis and H2O/CO2 co-electrolysis, and established a multi-scale and multi-physical coupling simulation model of SOFCs and SOECs. The process developed in this work paves the way for the demonstration and deployment of IGFC technology in the future.

Automated summary

The IGFC process combines coal gasification and high-temperature fuel cells to improve the efficiency of coal-based power generation and reduce CO2 emissions. The near-zero CO2 emissions program aims to achieve near-zero CO2 emissions by catalytic combustion of the flue gas from SOFC stacks and CO2 conversion using SOECs, providing a foundation for the future demonstration and deployment of IGFC technology.