Periodic Reporting for period 3 - EcoStock (Mobile thermal energy storage based on recycled ceramics)
Période du rapport: 2022-05-01 au 2023-04-30
In the industry sector, 50% of the energy consumed is lost as heat. This energy could be recovered and used to reduce the global energy consumption and the emission of greenhouse gases. For that purpose, technical solutions are necessary to manage industrial waste heat.
Furnaces & other related equipment used in heavy industrial processes waste ~4,200 TWh of 100+°C heat each year. The potential of 300+°C waste heat is ~750 TWh/year worldwide, including 7% in the EU1112. 20% of this waste heat is lost in clean fumes, thus the targeted sectors (ceramic & industry) lose around 150 TWh/year worldwide & 10 TWh/year in the EU.
Within the clean fumes market, the total waste heat potential to recover is shared between the batch (discontinuous) & tunnel (continuous) furnaces. As the tunnel furnaces are usually installed at the largest facilities, the potential for savings per industrial site is greater.
Eco-Tech Ceram has developed a storage technology able to store and recover at high temperature the waste heat of industrial fumes. This is the Eco-Stock(R) technology. This technology has been successfully implemented at industrial scale to recover the waste heat of a batch furnace of a ceramic factory in 2019.
The goal of the project is to show that the Eco-Stock solution is suitable to recover the waste heat of tunnel furnaces. This would significantly extend the market of Eco-Tech Ceram and would enable more industrial factories to save energy.
Furnaces & other related equipment used in heavy industrial processes waste ~4,200 TWh of 100+°C heat each year. The potential of 300+°C waste heat is ~750 TWh/year worldwide, including 7% in the EU1112. 20% of this waste heat is lost in clean fumes, thus the targeted sectors (ceramic & industry) lose around 150 TWh/year worldwide & 10 TWh/year in the EU.
Within the clean fumes market, the total waste heat potential to recover is shared between the batch (discontinuous) & tunnel (continuous) furnaces. As the tunnel furnaces are usually installed at the largest facilities, the potential for savings per industrial site is greater.
Eco-Tech Ceram has developed a storage technology able to store and recover at high temperature the waste heat of industrial fumes. This is the Eco-Stock(R) technology. This technology has been successfully implemented at industrial scale to recover the waste heat of a batch furnace of a ceramic factory in 2019.
The goal of the project is to show that the Eco-Stock solution is suitable to recover the waste heat of tunnel furnaces. This would significantly extend the market of Eco-Tech Ceram and would enable more industrial factories to save energy.
First, extensive research has been carried out to find an industrial partner willing to take part in the project and with a tunnel furnace adapted for waste heat recovery. Eco-Tech Ceram identified the Valence d'Agen factory of Villeroy & Boch (in France) to be suitable for the project. This is a ceramic factory using a 150-m long tunnel furnace.
The detailed information of the tunnel furnace was collected through on-site measurement campaigns and a technical audit carried out independently by a specialized partner of Eco-Tech Ceram. This work was difficult and slowed down by the sanitary and legislative constraints due to the COVID crisis (reduction of the tunnel furnace activity, travel restrictions...).
Eco-Tech Ceram used the collected information to investigate the best configuration for recovering the waste heat of the tunnel furnace with the Eco-Stock solution. 24 scenarios were studied to define the best technical parameters of the solution (size and number of storage units, durations of charge/discharge, heat storage material, power of the equipment...). The location of the Eco-Stock solution in the factory was defined in agreement with Villeroy & Boch. This is a critical point for the industrial partner since the implementation of the Eco-Stock solution reduces the available space in the factory. 3D diagrams have been made to size the installation and calculate the length of pipes.
The equipment to be implemented have been identified and the cost of the designed solution have been estimated.
Tunnel kilns characteristics are different from those of continuous kilns: the fumes temperature level is lower. ECO-TECH CERAM has chosen to add a POWER TO HEAT system to raise the temperature of the fumes by converting electricity into heat, and decarbonate a part of the heat used.
This storage system optimises the purchase cost of electricity, the price of which fluctuates sharply during the day.
The heat is therefore drawn from the kiln at 400°C, reheated with a PTH at 600 degrees and then re-injected directly both into the kiln and into the storage simultaneously. The storage enables the price of electricity to be smoothed out and, with POWER TO HEAT, ensures that the air is sufficiently hot.
In conclusion, the H2020 project has made it possible to:
- Demonstrate the technical feasibility of recovering this heat by controlling the pressure conditions in the kiln, the ability to increase this heat with the PTH to 600 degrees, and the ability to reinject the decarbonised hot air into the kiln in a controlled manner to reduce natural gas consumption, with or without storage.
- Validate the quality of the air returned to the kiln, which must be very clean in accordance with the high industrial partner's requirements.
- Validate the economic relevance of this solution, with a production capacity of 1.5 GWh/y at an average price €5 lower than that of gas.
- Validate a technological solution that reduces CO2 emissions by a factor 3 compared with fossil fuels.
Lastly, ECO-TECH CERAM wants to develop its business in a future market, namely that of massive electricity storage. This is a market that is essential to the development of rapidly growing renewable energies (climate change mitigation) and to the adaptation of networks that will need to be coupled and reinforced with solutions such as POWER TO HEAR TO POWER, which could be the subject of a future European project (Innovation Fund).
The detailed information of the tunnel furnace was collected through on-site measurement campaigns and a technical audit carried out independently by a specialized partner of Eco-Tech Ceram. This work was difficult and slowed down by the sanitary and legislative constraints due to the COVID crisis (reduction of the tunnel furnace activity, travel restrictions...).
Eco-Tech Ceram used the collected information to investigate the best configuration for recovering the waste heat of the tunnel furnace with the Eco-Stock solution. 24 scenarios were studied to define the best technical parameters of the solution (size and number of storage units, durations of charge/discharge, heat storage material, power of the equipment...). The location of the Eco-Stock solution in the factory was defined in agreement with Villeroy & Boch. This is a critical point for the industrial partner since the implementation of the Eco-Stock solution reduces the available space in the factory. 3D diagrams have been made to size the installation and calculate the length of pipes.
The equipment to be implemented have been identified and the cost of the designed solution have been estimated.
Tunnel kilns characteristics are different from those of continuous kilns: the fumes temperature level is lower. ECO-TECH CERAM has chosen to add a POWER TO HEAT system to raise the temperature of the fumes by converting electricity into heat, and decarbonate a part of the heat used.
This storage system optimises the purchase cost of electricity, the price of which fluctuates sharply during the day.
The heat is therefore drawn from the kiln at 400°C, reheated with a PTH at 600 degrees and then re-injected directly both into the kiln and into the storage simultaneously. The storage enables the price of electricity to be smoothed out and, with POWER TO HEAT, ensures that the air is sufficiently hot.
In conclusion, the H2020 project has made it possible to:
- Demonstrate the technical feasibility of recovering this heat by controlling the pressure conditions in the kiln, the ability to increase this heat with the PTH to 600 degrees, and the ability to reinject the decarbonised hot air into the kiln in a controlled manner to reduce natural gas consumption, with or without storage.
- Validate the quality of the air returned to the kiln, which must be very clean in accordance with the high industrial partner's requirements.
- Validate the economic relevance of this solution, with a production capacity of 1.5 GWh/y at an average price €5 lower than that of gas.
- Validate a technological solution that reduces CO2 emissions by a factor 3 compared with fossil fuels.
Lastly, ECO-TECH CERAM wants to develop its business in a future market, namely that of massive electricity storage. This is a market that is essential to the development of rapidly growing renewable energies (climate change mitigation) and to the adaptation of networks that will need to be coupled and reinforced with solutions such as POWER TO HEAR TO POWER, which could be the subject of a future European project (Innovation Fund).
The proposed scenario consists in recovering heat from the exhaust air of a ceramic tunnel furnace. This air is used to cool down the product at the exit of the furnace. Its temperature is about 300°C. The objective of the project is to heat up this hot air until 500-600°C using electrical heaters and to send the hot air to the storage unit. Increasing the hot air temperature enables to increase the storage capacity of the unit. Therefore, the storage is charged with a mix of waste and electrical heat. The electricity used to heat up the air could be low price electricity from the grid during off-peak hours or supplied by renewable energy sources (a PV installation on the roof of the factory is under study in parallel of this project). In any case, the storage enables to deal with the intermittency of such a supply and participates in the regulation of the electrical network or in the integration of intermittent renewable energy sources in the energy mix. The stored heat is then discharged to heat up the combustion air of the tunnel furnace’s burners. This improves the efficiency of the combustion process and reduces the natural gas consumption and hence the greenhouse gas emissions of the furnace.
Moreover, the recovery of the heat enables the electrification and hence the potential partial decarbonization of industrial heat at high temperature. This implies the fine control of the temperature and the power of discharge of the storage unit.
As expected, the project enabled ETC to validate a new aspect of its continuous kiln business. Following this convincing test, the customer asked us to equip all its burners with this solution. This will give rise to a commercial contract.
The industrial partner will promote the system on all its sites in Europe, which will serve as a showcase for ETC to equip as many tunnel kilns as possible. The project will generate several million euros in sales for ETC, including the creation of several dozen direct jobs.
In addition, ETC has demonstrated that this PTH + ECOSTOCK solution can be manufactured using entirely European products - which means the creation of many indirect jobs.
From a systemic point of view, deploying this solution will make our industries less fossil fuel-intensive - and therefore less CO2-emitting - and more competitive. Europe would then be more sovereign and more resilient.
Moreover, the recovery of the heat enables the electrification and hence the potential partial decarbonization of industrial heat at high temperature. This implies the fine control of the temperature and the power of discharge of the storage unit.
As expected, the project enabled ETC to validate a new aspect of its continuous kiln business. Following this convincing test, the customer asked us to equip all its burners with this solution. This will give rise to a commercial contract.
The industrial partner will promote the system on all its sites in Europe, which will serve as a showcase for ETC to equip as many tunnel kilns as possible. The project will generate several million euros in sales for ETC, including the creation of several dozen direct jobs.
In addition, ETC has demonstrated that this PTH + ECOSTOCK solution can be manufactured using entirely European products - which means the creation of many indirect jobs.
From a systemic point of view, deploying this solution will make our industries less fossil fuel-intensive - and therefore less CO2-emitting - and more competitive. Europe would then be more sovereign and more resilient.