SUstainable Glass: Architecture of a furnace heat recovery system including a steam Reformer

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

BACKGROUND

Climate change is the most critical environmental issue of the 21st century. It is caused by the accumulation in the atmosphere of enormous amounts of greenhouse gasses (GHG), among which carbon dioxide (CO2) is responsible for 64% of man-made global warming. Energy-intensive Industries, which include the glass industry, are the main sources of GHG emissions, due to their massive direct combustion of fossil fuels and use of electricity during manufacturing processes. In glass production much of the energy consumption is concentrated in the melting phase, and the EU is responsible for the consumption of about 4 Mtoe of energy and the emission of 10-12 Mtonne/year of CO2 (Glass Alliance Europe data, 2018). A glass furnace produces a considerable amount of waste gas at high temperature, typically at 1 400 1 600 degrees Celsius. In regenerative furnaces, the waste gas is partially reused in the heat recovery system; nevertheless, 35-40% of gas at high temperature is still lost.

OBJECTIVES

The aim of the LIFE SUGAR project is to provide the glass production industry with a new technology that reduces waste gas heat losses, enabling energy savings and a 10-15% reduction of CO2 emissions from the melting phase of the glass making process. This goal will be achieved through an innovative heat recovery system that exploits the generation of syngas as a thermal and chemical vector for the recovery of residual heat from the waste gas emitted from glass melting furnaces. The heat, escaping from the furnaces primary heat recovery system, is used to preheat a fraction of natural gas and to perform a Steam-Methane Reforming (SMR) reaction. The resulting syngas, rich in hydrogen, will then be burned in the furnace. The SRM system will be coupled with the heat recovery system of the patented Centauro furnace of project beneficiary Stara Glass. The additional heat exchange between waste gas and natural gas in the steam reforming process is expected to fully recover all exploitable wasted energy. The technology will be demonstrated at a 1:5 scale, on a furnace for the production of container glass, achieving a representative demonstration of its performance. About a quarter of the EU glass producers will be made aware of the new technology, so as to enhance immediate market introduction. Multiple opportunities for transfer to other sectors will also be investigated. Full introduction of the technology at EU level would result in a reduction of 0.4-0.5 Mtoe of energy consumption and around 1 million tonnes of CO2 emissions per year.

The project contributes to achieving targets set in the EU 2030 climate and energy framework, and addresses the EU Climate Change Mitigation policy priority no 4, actions which enhance the functioning of the emissions trading system and which have an impact on energy and greenhouse gas intensive industrial production.

RESULTS

Expected results:

A mock-up version of the SMR for the fine-tuning of construction and verification of the operating parameters, on a scale of 1 m3 utilising a maximum of about 15 standard m3/h of natural gas;

A validated pilot SMR installed in a commercial hybrid regenerative glass furnace producing hollow glass, with a capacity of 1:5 full scale and demonstrating in real-world environment the feasibility of 10-15% savings in energy consumption and CO2 emissions;

Total savings of 454 ton/year CO2 emissions and 190 toe/year energy consumption in the prototype;

Numerical tools and simulation approaches constituting the knowledge base and tools for design of future configuration and cases;

A life cycle assessment and an assessment of socio-economic impacts;

A final system design upscaled to an average glass furnace size for immediate introduction to the market;

An assessment of potential applications in the flat glass sector (side-port furnaces) and non-glass sectors;

An assessment of the potential for CO2 recovery will be carried out;

A business plan to launch LIFE SUGAR technology on the glass market and a replication and transferability plan to foster its wider use; and

An enhanced version of the Multipoint Continuous Monitoring instrument for the measurement of performances in the glass industry.