A Conceptual Design of Emission-Free Ammonia and Methanol Production

With the global human population increment, the fast growth of food demand presents grand challenges to the world. Rising anthropogenic CO₂ emissions and global temperature have continuously brought great concerns to the world. Ammonia plays a key role as a fertilizer in the agricultural industry, but the commonly used ammonia production method Haber-Bosch represents a huge part of the CO₂ emissions, which escalates climate warming. This paper has developed a novel conceptual design of emission-free ammonia and methanol production complex to produce multiple products simultaneously without CO₂ emissions. It employs natural gas, air, water, and nuclear energy as the major feedstocks and includes four subsystems: (i) an air separation unit; (ii) a water electrolysis plant; (iii) an ammonia production plant, and (iv) a methanol production plant. Through optimally integrating energy/material streams among four subsystems, the complex can produce ammonia, methanol, and pipeline-ready CO₂, simultaneously without carbon emissions. The whole complex is empowered by nuclear energy. The novel conceptual design of the industrial complex has been validated through rigorous simulations. Its economic and environmental benefits have also been provided.