Ammonia: the beer of decarbonization

The Haber-Bosch process, which turns nitrogen and hydrogen into ammonia, produces an essential ingredient in fertilizers and explosives. But it’s responsible for 2% of global emissions. 

Ammonia could become an important low-carbon fuel, because when combusted it emits no carbon. We could use it in ships, heavy industry and even mixed in with coal or gas in power plants. 

So what’s keeping us from using it as a new low-carbon fuel? And why would you use it instead of hydrogen, which you already need to make ammonia?

In this episode, Shayle talks to Julio Friedmann, chief scientist at Carbon Direct. Julio and a team of colleagues just co-authored a report on low-carbon ammonia for the Innovation for Cool Earth Forum.

They cover topics like:

• Why some countries like Japan, Singapore and Korea are especially interested in developing ammonia infrastructure.
• How ammonia compares to other low-carbon fuels like methanol and hydrogen.
• How we would need to retrofit coal and gas power plants to co-fire with ammonia
• Addressing ammonia’s corrosion and toxicity issues.
• The areas that need more research, such as ammonia’s impact on air quality and radiative forcing.
• Key constraints like human capital and infrastructure.

Recommended Resources:

• Innovation for Cool Earth Forum: Low-Carbon Ammonia Roadmap
• Canary: Watch this TED talk to get up to speed on green ammonia and shipping
• Canary: The race is on to build the world’s first ammonia-powered ship
• Chemical & Engineering News: Will Japan run on ammonia?

Full transcript here.

Catalyst is a co-production of Post Script Media and Canary Media.

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