Methanol production via solar reforming of methane

In the present work, a solar reforming process for production of methanol was investigated. With this process, it is possible to reduce the greenhouse-gas emissions associated with the production of methanol significantly in the near-term future. This would be a significant step in the development of a more sustainable chemical industry. Furthermore, methanol can be applied as a fuel. Thus, methanol can contribute to a more climate friendly energy supply, if it is produced via solar reforming.First of all, the overall reforming process was developed based on the concept of indirectly heated solar reforming. One central aspect of this was to make use of the waste-heat streams. As a consequence a large fraction of the off heat is converted into electricity in a water steam cycle, because no other demand exists for this heat. Furthermore, the off-gas stream of the methanol synthesis is partly used for additional electricity production.The developed process uses solar energy and natural gas to produce methanol and electricity. The ratio between the different streams can be changed by parameter variation. An optimization of the process with conventional criteria such as energy- or exergy-balances is therefore not possible. Thus, a new evaluation criterion was developed. This criterion is based on the target to reduce fossil fuels reduction and the associated greenhouse-gas emissions.Based on this evaluation criterion, the process was optimized by parameter variation. The results show that the process has the potential to make more efficient use of solar energy than is the case for sole production of electricity. A subsequent economic investigation showed that the developed process can in theory be competitive with conventional solar energy utilization. However, in practice support mechanism, as they exist for solar electricity production, would have to be implemented for solar production of chemical feedstocks