Energies 2023 , 16 , 280
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of Tanzania, India, Nigeria, and China. Industrial Methanol is used to heat buildings in Shanxi, dry tea in Darjeeling, and fuel cookstoves in restaurants in Shanghai. Methanol boilers surpass coal in terms of restricting pollution, as they reduce overall emissions of PM, SO x , and NOx by at least 75% [46].
Figure10. General production pathways of various carbon-neutral fuels and their key sector of application. 4. Challenges, Future Perspectives, and Conclusions The three fuels presented in this perspective have a critical role to play in the world’s quest of reaching carbon neutrality by mid 21st century. However, there are still some challenges that pose a potential threat to the realization of net zero carbon emissions via carbon-neutral fuels. Some of the common barriers to the up-scaling of all three fuels are summarized as follows. The main and universal challenge facing all three fuels concerns their investment costs when compared to fossil fuel-based processes. For instance, the price of renewable hydrogen is at least two times more expensive than that of grey hydrogen. One of the critical reasons for the discrepancies in fuel pricing between carbon-neutral fuels and their traditional counterpart stems from the fact that the latter is well-developed and already at hundreds of MW to GW capacities, and as such can negotiate for feedstocks at lower prices whiles most carbon-neutral fuels are still in kW to low MW capacities. Furthermore, the price variations between fossil-based and renewable-based fuels can be attributed to the high initial investment of renewable energy projects and the requirement for large electricity for the production of carbon-neutral fuels. Going forward, the cost of renewable energy technologies and clean electricity generation should decrease whiles simultaneously making the fossil-based pathways economically unattractive to pursue. Mechanisms such as carbon pricing, phasing out fossil fuel subsidies, private sector involvement in renewable energy development, and the establishment of production tax credits and investment tax credits for promoting wind and solar energy projects, respectively, could be instituted to make renewable electricity-based fuels cost-competitive against their fossil fuel alternatives. Since all three carbon-neutral fuels depend largely on renewable electricity (except bio- methanol), there is the issue of the intermittent and fluctuating nature of sources such as wind and solar energy. The power plants for producing carbon-neutral fuels need to be in operation frequently, and as such future developments should consider providing a stable and dependable electrical grid via the combination of both dispatchable and non- dispatchable sources of electricity as well as storage. To build a huge global market for carbon-neutral fuels, huge investments are required to develop a range of infrastructure for transportation and storage, especially in the case of hydrogen. There is a need to establish a well-functioning infrastructure that can handle the fuels after production, transport, and
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