The economics of power generation and energy storage via Solid Oxide Cell and ammonia

Green hydrogen finds its vital role in bridging the intermittent supplied renewable energy and fossil fuel infrastructure in a broad energy transition context. The bottleneck still lies in hydrogen's low volumetric energy density, prohibiting long-distance, large-scale, and cost-effective transportation. As a promising hydrogen carrier, ammonia possesses mature production, storage, transportation, and distribution supply chains. These advantages of ammonia enabled the possibility of transforming the renewable hydrogen at a minimum initial cost. This paper investigates the technological and economic feasibility of green ammonia utilization in the Solid Oxide Cells for power generation and energy storage. The result shows that the cost of Ammonia induced energy (183.75 US$/MWh) is significantly higher than that of natural gas power plants (81.77 US$/MWh). The main contributor is the fuel cost. In the optimum case, with fuel costs substantially dropping, the conceptual plant can be highly feasible, and the generated energy (97.40 USS$/MWh) is comparable to the conventional power plant.(c) 2022 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

Green hydrogen plays a vital role in energy transition, and ammonia, as a carrier of hydrogen, has a mature supply chain that helps reduce the cost of producing green hydrogen. The research shows that the cost of using ammonia as an energy source is higher than natural gas power plants, but it is still feasible when fuel costs significantly decrease.