Decarbonising Industry via BECCS: Promising Sectors, Challenges, and Techno-economic Limits of Negative Emissions

Purpose of Review This paper reviews recent literature on the combined use of bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) in the industries of steel, cement, paper, ethanol, and chemicals, focusing on estimates of potential costs and the possibility of achieving “negative emissions”. Recent Findings Bioethanol is seen as a potential near-term source of negative emissions, with CO2 transport as the main cost limitation. The paper industry is a current source of biogenic CO2, but complex CO2 capture configurations raise costs and limit BECCS potential. Remuneration for stored biogenic CO2 is needed to incentivise BECCS in these sectors. BECCS could also be used for carbon–neutral production of steel, cement, and chemicals, but these will likely require substantial incentives to become cost-competitive. While negative emissions may be possible from all industries considered, the overall CO2 balance is highly sensitive to biomass supply chains. Furthermore, the resource intensity of biomass cultivation and energy production for CO2 capture risks burden-shifting to other environmental impacts. Summary Research on BECCS-in-industry is limited but growing, and estimates of costs and environmental impacts vary widely. While negative emissions are possible, transparent presentation of assumptions, system boundaries, and results is needed to increase comparability. In particular, the mixing of avoided emissions and physical storage of atmospheric CO2 creates confusion of whether physical negative emissions occur. More attention is needed to the geographic context of BECCS-in-industry outside of Europe, the USA, and Brazil, taking into account local biomass supply chains and CO2 storage siting, and minimise burden-shifting.

Review of Stationary Energy Storage Systems Applications, Their Placement, and Techno-Economic Potential

Purpose of Review This review paper attempts to give a general overview on the BESS applications that demonstrate a high potential in the past few years, identifying most relevant operators — or providers — with the corresponding placement for such. Together with a description of value proposition schemes, observed trends, and research fields, a collection of relevant project references is gathered. Recent Findings Many publications and communications try to describe the services that battery energy storage systems can provide to each of the stakeholders, even though they might greatly differ based on national regulatory frameworks. The actual most relevant 6 applications in the view of the authors are described in more detail. Summary In this paper, there has been pointed special attention on the BESS opportunities for each operator and their corresponding potential on revenue stacking. Additionally, the most important identified scientific papers for the 6 most important applications in the view of the authors are presented.

The Potential of Power and Biomass-to-X Systems in the Decarbonization Challenge: a Critical Review

Purpose of the Review The scope of this work is to present a critical review of the novel class of plants for the enhanced production of bioproducts in power and biomass-to-X (PBtX) plants, where the excess carbon in the feedstock is converted into a product thanks to the addition of hydrogen from water electrolysis, rather than being vented as CO2. Recent Findings The review of the recent literature shows that (i) a significant gain in carbon efficiency can be achieved with this class of plants compared to corresponding biomass-to-X plants; (ii) there is high dependency of the power-to-X efficiency on the efficiency of the electrolysis system and a relatively low dependency on the final product; and (iii) the economic competitivity of PBtX plants is closely associated to the cost of hydrogen (i.e., electrolysis capital cost, electricity cost, and capacity factor) and such systems cannot rely only on green hydrogen from the low expected amounts of excess electricity from intermittent renewables. Summary In this work, through a simplified economic analysis, the region of competitiveness of this class of plants compared to other possible uses of biomass has been qualitatively identified. The research gaps mainly lie in the lack of assessments on the design and operating criteria of flexible PBtX plants and of studies providing insights on the value of flexibility for a PBtX plant, when integrated in the electric energy systems of the future.

A Grid for all Seasons: Enhancing the Integration of Variable Solar and Wind Power in Electricity Systems Across Africa

Purpose of review This review paper assesses recent scientific findings around the integration of variable renewable electricity (VRE) sources, mostly solar PV and wind power, on power grids across Africa, in the context of expanding electricity access while ensuring low costs and reducing fossil fuel emissions. Recent findings In this context, significant research attention has been given to increased cross-border transmission infrastructure between African countries to harness the spatiotemporal complementarities between renewable electricity resources, as well as to storage options, such as battery storage and power-to-gas. Summary Much of the recent, model-based literature suggests that a combination of increased interconnections in and between Africa’s power pools, leveraging spatiotemporal complementarities between solar PV, wind and hydropower, as well as a large-scale deployment of storage options could help African countries meet their burgeoning power demand with largely decarbonized electricity supply.