The main objective of this proposal is to investigate and evaluate the options and restrictions of methanation technologies which are currently under development for biomass derived SNG to apply these technologies to the upgrading of coal.
Steam-blown gasification technologies are available in the scale range between 500 kW thermal and 10 MW thermal . The technologies have been developed for the conversion biomass in small and medium-scale plants. The successful application of these technologies for coal will require an upscale of at least a factor of 10 in order to achieve the appropriate efficiency, which is comparable with state-of-the-art coal fired power plants. The application of steam-blown biomass gasification technologies for the gasification of coal and lignite needs therefore a detailed examination of technical barriers and the scalability of these technologies.
Further challenges come in particular from the chemical composition of coal. The high sulphur and ash content requires the adaptation of the gas cleaning technologies and the testing of different methanation catalysts.
Therefore the consortium will perform
• gasification tests with coal at an existing gasification pilot plant
• lab-scale methanation experiments with coal derived syngas
• process and gasifier layout for large-scale applications
• feasibility study and basic layout for a 5 MW pilot plant
