Stable and Clean Iron Power from ICONIC

Introduction

Iron Power is a new technology to store and transport sustainable energy. An iron aerosol mixture is burned in a flame, and the heat is used in high-temperature processes.

Process Overview

The formed iron-oxide powder is collected and transported to places with a surplus of green hydrogen, where it is regenerated back to iron powder. As such, Iron Power is a very promising CO2-free circular energy carrier of sustainable energy, which has a very high energy density, is easy to handle, safe, environmentally friendly, and cheap.

Challenges in Current Technology

Within the fast-growing Iron Power community, existing solid fuel combustion concepts are applied mostly, but these show severe problems caused by the specific character of iron aerosol flames:

1. Flame stabilization is difficult to establish.
2. Nano-particles are produced.
3. High NOx emissions are also difficult to circumvent.

A completely new combustion concept is needed to solve these problems.

Research and Development

The ERC program MetalFuel creates the basic knowledge on metal aerosol combustion with the right ingredients to solve these problems. The combustion concept developed is called ICONIC (Ignition COntrolled low-Nox Iron Combustion).

Project Objectives

Within this ERC PoC, a well-controllable ICONIC burner will be developed, designed, tested, and patented. A small-scale system will be developed and studied first, after which a conceptual design of Mega-Watt size will be developed, which will enable future implementation in an industrial-scale system.

Market Evaluation

Furthermore, the possible future market will be evaluated. A start-up is already interested, and a launching customer seems to be in view if the PoC is successful.