Techno-Economic Evaluation of HYCO Plant Integrated to Ammonia / Urea or Methanol Production with CCS

Publication Overview

The ammonia and methanol industry is an allied industry very related to the production of hydrogen or HyCO gas. Globally, around 60% of the produced hydrogen is consumed by these industries. Outside China, production of these chemicals from natural gas is predominant. In fact, the production of ammonia and methanol is always an important strategy on how natural gas assets are monetised. An important aspects of this study is to demonstrate how an SMR based hydrogen/HyCO production is integrated to an industrial complex. Furthermore, it is essential to understand the different aspects of the production process and how will it be affected when additional CO₂ is captured from the SMR’s flue gas. IEAGHG has commissioned this study to evaluate the performance and cost of deploying CO₂ capture and storage in mega-plants producing urea and methanol from natural gas as feedstock. The results presented in this study should form the basis of future studies in industrial CCS and CCU.

Publication Summary

• The IEA Greenhouse Gas R&D Programme (IEAGHG) have systematically evaluated the performance and cost of integrating CO₂ Capture and Storage (CCS) in various energy intensive industries. To date, the programme has assessed the economics of deploying CCS in the cement, iron and steel, hydrogen production from NG, pulp and paper industry, and with study in the oil refining industry underway.
• Ammonia/urea and methanol production are the pillars of the basic chemicals industry worldwide. Ammonia/urea is an important commodity used in the agriculture (fertiliser) and food industry. Whilst methanol is an important feedstock in production of various chemicals and fuel used in our daily lives. Globally (except for China), these commodities are mainly produced from NG or light hydrocarbons.
• The study presented a detailed baseline information of the performance and cost of deploying CO₂ capture in a SMR Based HyCO plant using natural gas as feedstock / fuel and operating as a captive plant (i.e. integrated within an industrial complex). This study presents the levelised cost of methanol and urea production and its corresponding CO₂ avoidance cost.
• The addition of capture of CO₂ from the flue gas of SMR increases the energy demand of the plant
• For the ammonia/urea production – an additional 8.6MWe of electricity is imported from the grid.
• For the methanol production – an additional 17.9 MWe of electricity is imported from the grid.
• In general, the addition of CCS increases the levelised cost of production.
• For the ammonia/urea production – this increases by 23 €/t urea.
• For the methanol production – this increases by 24 €/t methanol
• The CO₂ avoided cost of capturing additional CO₂ from the SMR plant is in the range of €80 to 100 per tonne CO₂ for both cases.
• The use of CO₂ in the production of urea or methanol is considered a mature technology. However, the economics of having or integrating both industrial CCS and CCU is not yet well established in the open literature. This study should provide a good basis for future study in understanding the performance and cost of implementing both industrial CCS and CCU.