LAPSE:2019.0575
Published Article
LAPSE:2019.0575
Life Cycle Assessment and Economic Analysis of an Innovative Biogas Membrane Reformer for Hydrogen Production
Gioele Di Marcoberardino, Xun Liao, Arnaud Dauriat, Marco Binotti, Giampaolo Manzolini
June 8, 2019
This work investigates the environmental and economic performances of a membrane reactor for hydrogen production from raw biogas. Potential benefits of the innovative technology are compared against reference hydrogen production processes based on steam (or autothermal) reforming, water gas shift reactors and a pressure swing adsorption unit. Both biogas produced by landfill and anaerobic digestion are considered to evaluate the impact of biogas composition. Starting from the thermodynamic results, the environmental analysis is carried out using environmental Life cycle assessment (LCA). Results show that the adoption of the membrane reactor increases the system efficiency by more than 20 percentage points with respect to the reference cases. LCA analysis shows that the innovative BIONICO system performs better than reference systems when biogas becomes a limiting factor for hydrogen production to satisfy market demand, as a higher biogas conversion efficiency can potentially substitute more hydrogen produced by fossil fuels (natural gas). However, when biogas is not a limiting factor for hydrogen production, the innovative system can perform either similar or worse than reference systems, as in this case impacts are largely dominated by grid electric energy demand and component use rather than conversion efficiency. Focusing on the economic results, hydrogen production cost shows lower value with respect to the reference cases (4 €/kgH2 vs 4.2 €/kgH2) at the same hydrogen delivery pressure of 20 bar. Between landfill and anaerobic digestion cases, the latter has the lower costs as a consequence of the higher methane content.
Keywords
biogas, economic analysis, fluidized bed membrane reactor, hydrogen production, life cycle assessment
Suggested Citation
Di Marcoberardino G, Liao X, Dauriat A, Binotti M, Manzolini G. Life Cycle Assessment and Economic Analysis of an Innovative Biogas Membrane Reformer for Hydrogen Production. (2019). LAPSE:2019.0575
Author Affiliations
Di Marcoberardino G: Politecnico di Milano, Dipartimento di Energia, via Lambruschini 4, 20156 Milano, Italy [ORCID]
Liao X: Quantis, EPFL Innovation Park building D, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland [ORCID]
Dauriat A: Quantis, EPFL Innovation Park building D, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
Binotti M: Politecnico di Milano, Dipartimento di Energia, via Lambruschini 4, 20156 Milano, Italy
Manzolini G: Politecnico di Milano, Dipartimento di Energia, via Lambruschini 4, 20156 Milano, Italy [ORCID]
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Journal Name
Processes
Volume
7
Issue
2
Article Number
E86
Year
2019
Publication Date
2019-02-08
Published Version
ISSN
2227-9717
Version Comments
Original Submission
Other Meta
PII: pr7020086, Publication Type: Journal Article
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LAPSE:2019.0575
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doi:10.3390/pr7020086
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Jun 8, 2019
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CC BY 4.0
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Jun 8, 2019
 
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Jun 8, 2019
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Original Submitter
Calvin Tsay
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