North Haven, CT (August 1st, 2024) – Precision Combustion, Inc. (PCI) announced today that it has won a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I award from the Department of Energy (DOE) Solar Energy Technology Office (SETO) for a new application employing Gen3 Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) falling particle bed receivers to provide direct heat for decarbonization of ethylene production. Meeting carbon and cost metrics will strongly support DOE’s goals for using Solar Industrial Process Heating (SIPH) to decarbonize synthetic fuel and chemicals manufacturing. PCI’s project team will be assisted by suppliers, universities, and DOE’s Sandia National Laboratories to assure success and further develop SIPH as an alternative to burning fossil fuels for industrial energy sources and other chemicals.
PCI’s new process improves the efficiency of using SIPH thermal particles, offering several key advantages over established highly energy intensive high carbon emissions ethane steam cracking. Benefits include employment of a near zero carbon energy source for ethane to ethylene conversion at equivalent to lower ethylene production costs. Additionally, the process has a simplified reactor design reducing CapEx, OpEx and has other life-cycle benefits versus ethane steam cracking.
The Petrochemical Manufacturing industry is the target market for our improved SIPH Thermal Particles for Decarbonization of Chemical Production technology, with ethylene key throughout the industry. Ethylene is used in a wide variety of industrial and consumer products, including everyday items such as plastic bags, plastic bottles, antifreeze, detergent, diapers, clothing, and housing materials. The ethylene supply chain is involved in many industries, including oil and gas extraction, chemical manufacturing, plastics and rubber products manufacturing, wholesalers, and transportation and warehousing.
Improvements to ethylene production could have the largest potential impact for energy savings in U.S. chemical manufacturing, with corresponding reductions in carbon impact, and with economic and employment benefits to U.S.-based producers and workers.
The Phase I project will focus on key issues of thermal particle selection and reactor design to maximize use of solar thermal energy and product yields. The work will include particle material selection and performance characterization, optimization of reaction behaviors in thermal particle beds, use of fluid and chemical process modeling to determine optimum reactor design and operating conditions, and analysis to demonstrate the cost and carbon impact benefits of the approach.
Kevin Burns, President of PCI states, “This is a new concept, still in an early stage. But if successful it has the potential to further improve decarbonization in synthetic fuels and chemicals manufacture. We appreciate the Department of Energy’s support in exploring this and look forward to developing this potential with support from ethylene production industry participants.”
Precision Combustion, Inc. is a clean energy and environmental technology company developing new reactors and systems for energy and environmental sector applications.
For more information, contact:
Stewart Rosenberg
Business Development Leader
Email: srosenberg@precision-combustion.com
