Upcycling Carbon Dioxide: Ethylene Glycol from Cleaned Fossil Carbon Chemical Industry CO2 and Renewable Electricity

The cost of carbon dioxide (CO2) capture from natural gas and coal power plants threatens to increase the price of energy to the consumer. This work will address the demonstration of large-scale utilization of captured waste CO2 by converting it into ethylene glycol, a monomer used in the production polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic. In the first demonstration, we will target utilizing waste CO2 from the chemical industry producing conventional plastics from fossil resources. Secondary markets include waste CO2 from power production, in this application including carbon utilization with existing carbon capture offsetting up to 150% of the CO2 capture costs, ensuring that the reduction in emissions in clean coal plants is economically feasible. RenewCO2 has demonstrated the small-scale prototype of ethylene glycol synthesis from concentrated waste CO2, water, and renewable electricity. In Phase I, we focused the lab-scale demonstration on 1) increasing the product formation, 2) developing a low capital cost electrolyzer, and 3) techno-economic analysis. In this Phase II, RenewCO2 will address the process's scale-up to a pilot plant and demonstrate long-term durability. An electrochemical stack will be developed and integrated into a pilot-scale process unit producing >100 kg of ethylene glycol product, which will be deployed and tested at a strategic partner site. Phase II of this research project builds on Phase I to accelerate the scale-up of the CO2 upcycling process developed by RenewCO2 together with Rutgers University. Phase I showed great promise for producing electrochemical cells from low-cost materials such as plastic and demonstrated a new reactor. In Phase II, the team will further increase the productivity of the process (reaction rate) by overcoming mass transport limitations of current systems and tuning catalyst formulation to achieve production rates of >1 g/h. Secondly, durability studies will be conducted to ensure long-term system performance. Through these optimizations and by utilizing new 2nd generation fiber-reinforced polymers with greatly enhanced physical, the team will tackle high capital costs that present a barrier for entry for companies considering this technology. For the large-scale components needed for electrolyzers and with the low-cost synthesis method developed at Rutgers, we expect to leverage the low cost with no loss in performance in the final cells. In this Phase, we will investigate additional capital cost reductions possible from manufacturing methods. Together these advances will be the most crucial step for achieving a cost- competitive process for commercialization. The global ethylene glycol market is projected to grow at more than 4-6% per year; however, fluctuating raw material costs are limiting market expansion. The market currently undergoes boom/bust cycles as capacity is most often increased too rapidly, resulting in excess offer and reducing sales prices. Providing the industry with a method for modular expansion of the capacity at no increased CapEx will lessen the financial risk in the sector tremendously. This technology also utilizes CO2 conversion, offering a new and efficient route to produce ethylene glycol from renewable sources while using waste carbon dioxide from the conventional fossil fuel-powered process. One of the advantages of electrochemical conversion technologies is that it allows for versatile feedstocks. As the demand for ethylene glycol increases, additional capacity is needed, and on-site power generation plants will be outfitted with CC combined with our demonstrated carbon utilization technologies. Electrosynthesis from carbon dioxide to ethylene glycol has generally been energy inefficient, causing high production costs and preventing commercialization until development of the present technology. This technology will provide new opportunities for efficient chemical production and feedstock diversification while at the same time reducing carbon dioxide emissions.