Solar Thermochemical CO2 Splitting Integrated with Supercritical CO2 Cycle for Efficient Fuel and Power Generation

Xiangjun Yu; Wenlei Lian; Ke Gao; Zhixing Jiang; Cheng Tian; Nan Sun; Hangbin Zheng; Xinrui Wang; Chao Song; Xianglei Liu

LAPSE

Living Archive for Process Systems Engineering

LAPSE:2023.34672

Published Article

LAPSE:2023.34672

Solar Thermochemical CO2 Splitting Integrated with Supercritical CO2 Cycle for Efficient Fuel and Power Generation

Xiangjun Yu, Wenlei Lian, Ke Gao, Zhixing Jiang, Cheng Tian, Nan Sun, Hangbin Zheng, Xinrui Wang, Chao Song, Xianglei Liu

April 27, 2023

Converting CO2 into fuels via solar-driven thermochemical cycles of metal oxides is promising to address global climate change and energy crisis challenges simultaneously. However, it suffers from low energy conversion efficiency (ηen) due to high sensible heat losses when swinging between reduction and oxidation cycles, and a single product of fuels can hardly meet multiple kinds of energy demands. Here, we propose an alternative way to upsurge energy conversion efficiency by integrating solar thermochemical CO2 splitting with a supercritical CO2 thermodynamic cycle. When gas phase heat recovery (εgg) is equal to 0.9, the highest energy conversion efficiency of 20.4% is obtained at the optimal cycle high pressure of 260 bar. In stark contrast, the highest energy conversion efficiency is only 9.8% for conventional solar thermochemical CO2 splitting without including a supercritical CO2 cycle. The superior performance is attributed to efficient harvesting of waste heat and synergy of CO2 splitting cycles with supercritical CO2 cycles. This work provides alternative routes for promoting the development and deployment of solar thermochemical CO2 splitting techniques.

Record ID

LAPSE:2023.34672

Keywords

cerium dioxide, concentrated solar, solar fuel, thermochemical cycle, thermodynamic analysis

Subject

Energy Systems

Suggested Citation

Yu X, Lian W, Gao K, Jiang Z, Tian C, Sun N, Zheng H, Wang X, Song C, Liu X. Solar Thermochemical CO2 Splitting Integrated with Supercritical CO2 Cycle for Efficient Fuel and Power Generation. (2023). LAPSE:2023.34672

Author Affiliations

Yu X: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
Lian W: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China; Integrated Energy Institute, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China [ORCID]
Gao K: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
Jiang Z: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
Tian C: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
Sun N: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
Zheng H: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
Wang X: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
Song C: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China
Liu X: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China; Integrated Energy Institute, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 210016, China

Journal Name

Energies

Volume

15

Issue

19

First Page

7334

Year

2022

Publication Date

2022-10-06