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Date & Time
December 4, 2024 ; 10h00 - 11h00 CET
Speakers
Description
Industrial emissions in Europe remain persistently high. With climate deadlines looming, high-temperature heat pumps can play a vital role in meeting decarbonisation goals.
High-temperature heat pumps using renewable electricity have the potential to replace fossil fuels and enhance energy and resource efficiency, significantly reducing industry’s CO2 footprint. This technology offers a promising future as efficient heat transformers for heating and cooling applications, especially for waste heat utilisation and recovery.
Despite steady growth in the range of these high-temperature heat pumps, however, lack of clear information about capabilities, design, control, integration and suitable applications is hindering broad implementation.
On 4 December 2024, we welcomed Dr. Cordin Arpagaus, Senior Research Engineer at OST – Eastern Switzerland University of Applied Sciences, Institute for Energy Systems IES, to provide:
- A market overview of high-temperature heat pump suppliers
- Insight into the limitations and state of current technology
- Potential applications for steam generation
- Three key recommendations for broader market adoption of high-temperature heat pumps
Recording
Key Takeaways
- High-Temperature Heat Pumps (HTHPs) are a key technology for decarbonising industrial process heat below 200°C, representing 37% of European industry’s process heat demand.
- Market insights: Increasing adoption of HTHPs, with 23 market-ready systems (TRL 8-9) and ongoing developments for higher-temperature applications.
- Potential applications: Food, paper, and chemical sectors show the highest potential for HTHP integration, utilising waste heat between 40°C and 100°C.
- Environmental benefits: HTHPs enable significant CO₂ emission reductions when powered by renewable electricity, with growing reliance on green energy in Europe.
- Steam as a critical energy carrier: High demand for steam in industries, making HTHPs a crucial solution for efficient and sustainable steam generation.
- Efficiency and cost-effectiveness: HTHPs demonstrate high Coefficient of Performance (COP), improving operational efficiency and competitiveness compared to fossil-based systems.
- Technology Readiness: Varied levels of readiness, with proven systems up to 200°C and laboratory prototypes targeting even higher temperatures.
- Key challenges: High initial investment, lack of standardisation, and limited awareness are barriers to broader adoption.
- Refrigerants in HTHPs: Natural refrigerants like ammonia and CO₂, and newer HFOs, are central to reducing environmental impact.
- Integration in industrial processes: Effective for drying, sterilisation, distillation, and steam generation, replacing conventional fossil-fuel-based systems.
- Business Models: Direct-to-customer sales dominate, but innovative models like "Heat-as-a-Service" are emerging.
- Regional Market Dynamics: Adoption varies significantly across Europe, influenced by energy prices, policy incentives, and industry readiness.
- Ongoing R&D: Focus on enhancing efficiency, developing compact systems, and extending operational temperatures.
- Economic Viability: Market attractiveness depends on the cost ratio between electricity and gas, with favourable conditions in regions with cheaper electricity.
- Policy and standardisation needs: Stronger support for knowledge sharing, guidelines, and workforce training are crucial for scaling up deployment.
- Case Studies: Demonstrations in the paper, food, and chemical industries highlight successful HTHP applications, achieving substantial energy and cost savings.
- Future Directions: Development of steam-generating heat pumps and multi-stage systems for broader industrial compatibility.
- Recommendations for growth: Increase standardisation, improve information transfer, and train qualified personnel for optimal implementation.
Q&A
The Q&A session was not recorded. The author has provided written responses to some questions below for your reference.
Q: What are reasonable temperature lifts before installing an electrical heater?
In Europe, a COP of 3 is reached at about 60 K temperature lift, which would be a nice application for a heat pump. Then, the heat pump is 3 times more efficient than an electrical heater. In China, a COP of even 2 is economical for a heat pump application, corresponding to a temperature lift of about 90 K. An electrical heater could be a backup solution or combined with a heat pump to cover the peak loads.
Q: What are the average prices and associated payback for the different range capacities?
The specific investment cost for HTHPs (excl. integration) is about 500 to 1’000 EUR/kW heating capacity. It depends on the size and supplier. The payback time depends on the energy prices over the lifetime.
Q: What is the typical break-up of the cost (Compressor only, storage tank, pumps, other auxiliary, service for assembly, service for installation and commissioning) in %? Is the import of compressors and/or heat pumps in India a cause for higher capex?
Typically, the heat pump equipment cost is about 50% of the total project cost (Multiplication factor of about 2). It can be lower or higher depending on the complexity of integration. I would assume some import tax on components from other countries.
Q: What is the evolution of investment cost over time?
Industrial heat pump technology is still at an early stage. The cost evolution is difficult to predict. I expect a cost decrease with more experience and standardisation.
Q: Interesting that you're in Australia. Given the renewables landscape, how do you see the potential for industrial heat pumps?
Yes, Australia is interesting. A lot of renewable electricity is produced. Gas is mainly used for process heating. Therefore, there is huge potential for renewable heating technologies for decarbonization. However, competition exists between solar thermal, biomass, electrical heating, and electrical-driven industrial heat pumps.
Q: I'm a bit surprise by the 51% figure of HP in France. It rather about 5% 2M/37,5M dwellings. https://www.usinenouvelle.com/article/dix-chiffres-pour-comprendre-le-marche-francais-de-la-pompe-a-chaleur.N2175117
51% is France's heat pump market share for space heating. The data source is EHPA (Chart 1.0-7): https://stats.ehpa.org/home/report-charts/
Q: What are the refrigerants used in HTHPs? Are there any future trends?
There are synthetic HFCs, HFOs, natural refrigerants like CO2, ammonia, hydrocarbons, and noble gases like helium. The future trend goes towards natural refrigerants in heat pumps. However, there are challenges with flammability, toxicity, environmental issues, …
Q: I am interested in the typical refrigerants used in HTHPs, both low-stage and high-stage, in a combined cycle system or multiple cycle systems.
The refrigerant combination can be synthetic (e.g., R515B/R1233zd) or natural (e.g., iso-pentane R601a/water R718, ammonia R717/water R718), etc. It depends mainly on the compressor type (e.g., piston, screw, turbo).
Q: How are explosion and fire risks managed with natural refrigerants (butane, pentane, etc.)?
Heat pumps with flammable refrigerants need additional safety measures, like gas sensors, alarms, ventilation, ATEX components, etc.
Q: Do you have any impression on how "green" is the HTHP systems? Compared to boiler tech. but also to Solar Concentrated tech too?
The CO2 emissions can be reduced substantially by electrical-driven heat pumps over the lifetime (20 to 25 years) if the CO2-emission factor of the used electricity is low (ideally renewable electricity). However, studies on LCA Life-Cycle-Assessment are rare. Comparisons to other renewable heating technologies is still a research gap.
Q: Can you elaborate a bit on the current challenges and future potential of heat pumps exceeding 200 °C (or exceeding even 280 °C as the Spilling heat compressor claims)? What are the key research pathways to reach even higher temperatures and hence open up heat pumps for even more processes?
There are heat pump technologies and concepts available exceeding 250 °C. For example, supercritical CO2 cycles, Brayton cycle with air, steam Rankine cycle, etc. However, higher temperatures come with efficiency trade-offs. High temperatures also require a high heat source temperature to achieve an acceptable efficiency (COP depending on the temperature lift). In addition, there are material challenges on the durability of components.
Further reading
You can download a PDF copy of the presentation in the download section below. It contains numerous links to other resources, such as publications, webinars, and reports. All links are clickable in the PDF.
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