IABP: Climate-neutral fuels for freight and heavy-duty transport

Defossilization of the mobility sector is a major challenge for Germany: For 2030, the gap in CO₂ savings compared to plans is expected to be 40 million tons per year.

The MeFuSION research alliance wants to change that: Climate-neutral methanol - produced from carbon dioxide, water and renewable energies - is to be made usable for fuel cell-based freight and heavy-duty transport, thus making a contribution to climate-neutral mobility where batteries are practically impossible to use. In freight and heavy-duty transport in particular, the energy density in relation to the volume and weight of the energy carrier, as well as the refueling time, are decisive factors in addition to the overall system (costs, infrastructure, flexibility). Here, the liquid chemical methanol has significant advantages over gaseous or battery-powered drives. In addition, compared with combustion, fuel cell technology ensures more efficient use of the energy stored in methanol for mobility, reducing the effective power requirement per route. A further advantage is the improvement in exhaust gas and thus air quality, since neither unburned hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides nor carbon monoxide and particulate matter are emitted.

The MeFuSION network consists of the companies CreativeQuantum, the fuel cell expert Gumpert Automobile, as well as the research institutes DBI-GTI and the Department Life Cycle Engineering (GaBi) of the faculty's Institute for Acoustics and Building Physics IABP. C1 Green Chemicals AG is an associated partner, responsible for the production of larger quantities of methanol using the new process. The MeFuSION project has been funded since Oct. 1, 2022, and for three years with a total of 2.9 million euros as part of the overall Renewable Fuels Concept by the German Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport. The funding guideline for the development of renewable fuels is coordinated by NOW GmbH and implemented by the project management agencies VDI/VDE Innovation + Technik GmbH and Fachagentur Nachwachsende Rohstoffe e. V..

MeFuSION stands for Methanol Fuel-Cell Supply chain Investigation. The MeFuSION alliance sees the potential to substitute the existing internal combustion engine fleets in long-distance freight transport (trucks, shipping) with regeneratively fueled methanol fleets, thereby bringing about a significant reduction in CO₂ emissions. The associated CO2 savings potential in Germany alone is immense and would thus make a significant sector contribution to achieving the national climate targets. In view of the urgency, this potential can be leveraged much more quickly than via alternative technologies.

The partners are pursuing the following key objectives:

• scaling up the conversion of carbon dioxide (CO₂) to carbon monoxide(CO) using the reverse water gas shift (rWGS) process,
• scaling up the production of regenerative methanol from carbon monoxide and hydrogen using the capture-and-hydrogenation approach (CHA),
• the more efficient separation of the regenerative methanol from the reaction solution,
• the qualification of the regenerative methanol for operation in fuel cell mobility, and
• the sustainability assessment of the overall system.

To this end, the innovation process already initiated in the E4MeWi project for a novel production process of regenerative methanol is to be scaled up, and the necessary technological maturity for a market entry in the segment of climate-friendly long-distance freight transport is to be achieved in the follow-up phase.