The US Department of Energy has awarded $3.2m to Solar MEAD, a joint project headed by CEMEX, Sandia National Laboratories, and Synhelion, which aims to decarbonise cement production, according to a press release by the companies published recently.
Solar MEAD has ambitious plans to replace the use of fossil fuels with concentrated solar thermal (CST) energy in clinker production, the key component in cement. CEMEX and Synhelion have been working together to introduce CST in the cement production process, achieving the first successful laboratory-scale demonstrative pilot in 2022 by producing the first-ever solar clinker.
Clinker production
Clinker is produced by fusing limestone, clay, and other materials in a rotary kiln at temperatures nearing 1500°C. Polluting fossil fuels are traditionally used to heat the kiln and are responsible for about 40% of the direct CO2 emissions of the process.
Synhelion's breakthrough technology delivers high-temperature process heat beyond 1500°C.
"Cement produced with solar energy is an exciting technology with tremendous potential to reduce the carbon footprint of cement production," said Fernando A González, CEO of CEMEX.
"Achieving our net zero carbon goal by 2050 will require relentless innovation such as this to discover and scale breakthrough technologies."
The new project will look at methods to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, lower process temperatures, and increase the efficiency of clinker formation using solar energy.
"Few renewable technologies are capable of generating heat at the temperatures needed to process raw cement feedstock," said Nathan Schroeder, Sandia researcher and principal investigator for the Solar MEAD project.
"This project will advance our understanding of how to use concentrating solar technology to gather and deliver the heat to existing cement production facilities and will have crosscutting relevance to other ore processing industries such as refractory, ceramics, and battery production."
Replacement of fossil fuels
If the companies prove successful, their new process will not only allow for 100% replacement of fossil fuels but also result in a more efficient and lower-cost carbon capture process when compared to the current state-of-the-art technologies.
"The project offers us the opportunity to use our sustainable technology to support the decarbonisation of energy-intensive cement clinker production," said Gianluca Ambrosetti, CEO and co-founder of Synhelion.
"This solution can have a huge impact on the industry and will help to pave the way towards net zero. We are proud of contributing to this goal."