Session: 09-01 Industrial Process Heat and Waste Heat

Paper Number: 116484

116484 - Decarbonizing Industrial Process Heat: A Technoeconomic Framework for Heat Source Selection 

Heat is the dominant end-use of energy globally, and over 90% of heat is generated from fossil fuels with a significant carbon footprint. Despite its importance the Levelized Cost of Heat (LCOH), which provides a technoeconomic framework for comparative evaluation of different thermal sources, has not received the same level of attention as the Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) that has been calculated by researchers and practitioners for various power sources. This is in part due to the different heat sources as well as the wide range of temperatures from 25-2500°C that depend on the application. Herein, we formalize a figure of merit for decarbonizing heat and refer to it as the Levelized Cost of Decarbonized Heat Delivered (LCOH). With the goal of making process heat carbon neutral, we account for the cost of carbon capture when the energy source has associated emissions. We then apply this new framework to compare the current costs of heat delivered from four different sources (natural gas, hydrogen, grid electricity, and solar-thermal) to three different industrial processes (steam production, ethane cracking, and glass melting). These energy sources span the range of options for the industrial and building sectors, while the three processes span a wide range of temperatures encountered in these sectors using representative values from the United States. We find that the LCOH is typically dominated by fuel costs, followed by carbon costs. We use this generalizable framework to make LCOH projections toward 2050 and suggest several insights and research directions. Notably, natural gas is likely the cheapest heat source in the United States even after paying for carbon capture, and dramatic reductions in the cost and availability of renewable energy and energy storage are needed to enable cost- and emissions-favorable electrification.

Presenting Author: Akanksha Menon Georgia Tech

Presenting Author Biography: Dr. Akanksha Menon is an Assistant Professor in the Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech and directs the Water-Energy Research Lab. Prior to this, she was a Rosenfeld Postdoctoral Fellow in the Energy Technologies Area at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, where she continues to be a Research Affiliate. Her research focuses on applying thermal science/engineering and functional materials to develop sustainable technologies for the water-energy nexus. Examples include solar desalination for a circular water economy, thermal energy storage for decarbonizing heat, novel heat-driven air conditioning cycles, and carbon-negative building materials. Dr. Menon is a recipient of the NSF CAREER Award in 2023, she was recognized as a Riser by DARPA in 2022, and she is in the Class of 1969 Teaching Fellows cohort. Dr. Menon is a recipient of the 2019 Sigma Xi Dissertation Award and the 2017 Materials Research Society (MRS) Silver Award. She was also recognized in the 2020 Falling Walls Breakthroughs of the Year: Emerging Talents category, and she was featured by the U.S. Department of Energy in their Women @ Energy initiative.