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Article

Advances Reported for MCH and LH2

Stephen H. Crolius May 23, 2019

Two recent announcements show that the race is still very much on among the energy carriers that until recently were a focus of the Japanese Cabinet Office’s Cross-Ministerial Strategic Innovation Promotion Program (SIP). During its five-year career, the SIP Energy Carriers initiative promoted the development of liquid hydrogen (LH2), liquid organic hydrides (LOH), and ammonia as technologies that could animate a hydrogen supply chain spanning continents and oceans. The announcements regarding LH2 and methyl cyclohexane (MCH -- the main Energy Carriers focus in the LOH area) show that the conclusion of the Energy Carriers work at the end March does not mean the conclusion of work on these two rivals to ammonia energy.

Article

Ammonia Covered in Forbes.com Power-to-X Review

Stephen H. Crolius May 16, 2019

Last week, Forbes.com published Power-To-X In The German Experience: Another In The List Of Growing Energy Transition Strategies. The article in effect nominates ammonia as a singularly promising up-and-comer in the field of the alternative energy vectors. Such an endorsement is heartening, but the article is notable as much for who is delivering the message – and the fact of its delivery under the Forbes masthead – as for what the message is.

Article

NH3 vs. MCH: Energy Efficiency of Hydrogen Carriers Compared

Stephen H. Crolius May 09, 2019

Volume 174 of the journal Energy, published on May 1, 2019, includes a paper by Shin’ya Obara, Professor in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at the Kitami Institute of Technology in Japan, that should be of interest to hydrogen advocates everywhere. The paper, "Energy and exergy flows of a hydrogen supply chain with truck transportation of ammonia or methyl cyclohexane," concludes that a hydrogen supply chain based on ammonia has better energy efficiency than one based on methyl cyclohexane (MCH).

Article

IEA Completes Two Power-to-Ammonia Reports

Stephen H. Crolius May 03, 2019

The International Energy Agency has completed two reports that examine the economics of hydrogen and ammonia production based on wind and solar electricity generation. Both reports were written by IEA Consultant Julien Armijo under the supervision of IEA Senior Analyst Cédric Philibert. One focuses on China and formalizes the findings and conclusions that were the subject of a February 2019 Ammonia Energy post. The other focuses on Chile and Argentina. Both reports cast an encouraging light on the near-term cost-competitiveness of green ammonia vs. conventionally produced brown ammonia in specific national markets.

Article

New Video Summarizes SIP Energy Carriers Accomplishments

Stephen H. Crolius April 18, 2019

ANNOUNCEMENT: The Japanese Government’s Cabinet Office and the Japan Science and Technology Agency have released an English-language video that summarizes the accomplishments of the Cross-Ministerial Strategic Innovation Promotion Program’s Energy Carriers initiative. The release coincides with the end-of-March conclusion of Energy Carriers’ work, and anticipates this month’s formal activation of the Green Ammonia Consortium.

Article

METI Releases Major Revision to Hydrogen Roadmap

Stephen H. Crolius April 10, 2019

Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) announced on March 12 that it had released a “major revision” to the country’s Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Strategy Roadmap. The Roadmap was first formulated in 2014 to “secure the goals set forth in the Basic Hydrogen Strategy and the 5th Basic Energy Plan for the realization of a hydrogen society.” The Roadmap’s last revision in 2016 predates new editions of the foundation documents that were released in December 2017 and July 2018, respectively.

Article

Dutch Company Breaks New Ground in Ammonia Combustion

Stephen H. Crolius April 04, 2019

Earlier this year the Dutch company Duiker Combustion Engineers shared a company paper with Ammonia Energy that targets ammonia energy as an application for the company’s proprietary stoichiometry-controlled oxidation (SCO) technology. The technology’s original commercial deployment in petroleum refining occurred in 2010, and now the company sees potentially broad applications for it as a sustainable energy expedient in the industrial and electricity sectors.

Article

Stanford Convenes Hydrogen Focus Group

Stephen H. Crolius March 29, 2019

ANNOUNCEMENT: California's Stanford University held a two-day workshop this week to launch a new effort aimed at advancing hydrogen “for stable, long-term, low-carbon energy storage.” The Stanford Hydrogen Focus Group intends to support research, serve as a technical resource, and disseminate information via workshops and symposia.

Article

SMARTCATS Workshop: Ammonia for Fueling Future Energy

Stephen H. Crolius March 21, 2019

ANNOUNCEMENT: SMARTCATS, an Action within Europe’s “intergovernmental framework” for Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST), has this week published the list of keynote speakers for its Ammonia for Fueling Future Energy Workshop, which will be held on April 13 and 14 in Lisbon, Portugal. Speakers will include John Bøgild Hansen, Senior Scientist at Haldor Topsoe and member of the Ammonia Energy Association (AEA) Board of Directors; Bill David, University of Oxford Professor and member of the AEA Advisory Board; and myself in my role as AEA President.

Article

EPRI Releases Ammonia Energy Report

Stephen H. Crolius March 07, 2019

Last month the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) released Renewable Ammonia Generation, Transport, and Utilization in the Transportation Sector, the organization’s first public treatment of ammonia energy. The report is positioned as a communique from the cutting edge – a “Technology Insights Brief” from EPRI’s “Innovation Scouts” – and, bracingly, manages to be both brief and comprehensive. Within its format, it does an excellent job of conveying the positive case for ammonia energy and the R&D that will allow it to reach its potential.