WO2023143856A2

WO2023143856A2 - Construction materials made of carbon fibres produced from co2

Info

Publication number: WO2023143856A2
Application number: PCT/EP2023/000010
Authority: WO
Inventors: Kolja Kuse; Britta Waschl; Jörg FREIHERR VON UND ZU WEILER
Original assignee: Kolja Kuse; Britta Waschl; Freiherr Von Und Zu Weiler Joerg
Priority date: 2022-01-29
Filing date: 2023-01-29
Publication date: 2023-08-03
Also published as: WO2023143856A3; DE202022000235U1

Abstract

The invention describes carbon fibres which are produced from CO2 on the basis of various process chains. In addition to the route via Fischer-Tropsch synthesis, these also include routes via natural raw materials to produce carbon fibre raw materials such as PAN from CO2, such as terrestrial biomass or algal biomass, wherein a process step is also incorporated that ensures the inexpensive and natural extraction of CO2 from the ocean and thus indirectly also from the air. In addition to extraction from terrestrial biomass, this is done, for example, by extracting macroalgae from the ocean, which are transformed using bacteria, fungi or yeasts into alkanes or alcohols that serve as fuel for renewable power supply and in the process emit quasi-pure CO2 and water. In this way, atmospheric CO2, which is to some extent anthropogenic in origin, is to be converted via an energy recovery process in the form of electric current into a solid state of carbon fibre which, at the end of its life cycle, can be put in a waste repository after having had a high utility to industry and humans as a construction material for the construction of buildings and other structures, such as bridges and vehicles.

Description

Carbon fiber building materials made from CO2

The Paris Agreement of December 2015 presents the international community with the challenge of keeping the increase in the average global temperature below 1.5 °C by 2100 and beyond. To this end, measures are required that use improved process technology to significantly increase the efficiency of converting CO2 into usable, regeneratively produced material. This material is essentially composed of two categories of materials that drive the world economy. One category includes materials such as fuels, lubricating oils and other liquid or gaseous fuels for the operation of gas turbines, diesel power plants, the propulsion of aircraft, vehicles and ships, as well as the heating of buildings or the operation of cooking stoves. These gas turbines and diesel power plants can also be operated purely regeneratively.

The second category includes the production of building and construction materials, which can now be produced from CO2.

The connection between energy production and material production has already been established in the applications PCT/EP2009/008497 and PCT/EP2017/001269, in which it is recommended that waste gases from energy production may be the source of the CO2 required for the production of biomass, from which building and construction materials are produced in the next step. In the two patent applications cited above, the production of algal oils is proposed as a biogenic CCh uptake method. In other applications such as DE 20 2019 001 192.7, the processing of algae biomass or other biomass with the aid of fungal cultures, bacteria and yeasts is also proposed. These yeasts, fungi and any kind of bacteria can not only serve to increase efficiency, but also describe completely new ways to generate CO2 for carbon fiber production, which can then serve as primary material for the biogenic route as well as artificial routes via, for example the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis. In this new invention, in addition to the fermentation of land-based biomass, the Fermentation of biomass that comes from the world's oceans, namely in particular algae biomass in the form of macroalgae, but also other sea-based biomass that can be taken from the sea, which will occur there in scalable quantities in the future - in particular also caused by the acidification of the seas - or which can also be deliberately bred for the purpose of extracting CO2 from the seas, which the biomass absorbs and metabolizes as it grows. The biomass can then be converted to methane with the help of bacteria, fungi or yeasts, which is burned in a gas turbine to generate electricity, and then the CCh portion of the exhaust gases, consisting of CO2, water and possibly. Nitrogen into the tanks of microalgae and to process the oils obtained from it into carbon fibers, as described in PCT/EP2017/001269, for example. If natural gas, i.e. fuels consisting largely of methane gases, are initially used in these power plants, then this bridging technology can be regarded as a preparatory instrument and investment for a scalable use of atmospheric CO2 from land-based biomass and sea-based biomass, the extraction of which from the air by plants in fields, forests and meadows, especially via the route of food residues, and from the water via the route of macroalgae fishing.

In addition to the removal of land-based biomass, this is done by removing macroalgae from the sea, which are transformed into alkanes or alcohols with the help of bacteria, fungi or yeasts, which serve as fuel for regenerative power supply with the help of gas power plants, which produce virtually pure CO2 and emit water. The effort to extract CO2, i.e. its separation (sequestration) from other gases such as water vapor and nitrogen, is very efficient and cheap in this way. If pure oxygen instead of air is used to burn the methane and other gases - various oxy fuel processes have been developed for this - then energy generation and CO2 separation becomes even more efficient and cheaper. The oxygen required for this is a by-product of the now rapidly developing hydrogen production. As long as sufficient quantities of biogas are available, the here However, the processes described are driven with fossil gas, i.e. the generation of electricity from natural gas forms the basis for the CO2 production for the production of carbon fibers at the beginning of the processes described here, either via the biogenic route of feeding microalgae with CO2 or via the water gas shift Reaction and subsequent Fischer-Tropsch synthesis for the production of methanol from CO2 and H2, with subsequent merging of these processes in the production of polyacrylonitrile for the production of PAN-based carbon fibers.

A biogenic route is proposed for the later culmination in a sustainable production of CO2 for carbon fiber production because a lot of CO2 is absorbed by the oceans anyway, which is why the sea-based form of CCh extraction appears more efficient and cheaper than extraction from the air. The algae carpets are already emerging today and are already being recognized by some researchers as a CCh sink that they want to transport to the sea floor, which does not bring any economic added value but, like CCS, causes high costs. This invention is intended to avoid this, these algae are to be regarded as one of the keys to using green methane gas in a scalable manner. Combined with the production of oxygen during electrolysis with surplus wind power, there is a triple synergistic effect of regenerative energy production technologies such as wind energy and PV together with the efficient production of carbonaceous materials for efficient and sustainable carbon storage, as well as the scalable removal of CO2 via the large capacities of the world's oceans, which is an unsolved problem.

Various measures are discussed to achieve this. The introduction of regenerative energy sources such as wind, water and solar power is intended to replace fossil fuels for energy production. Experience with the introduction of wind power and photovoltaic systems, for example in Germany, has led to the realization that these measures are effective, but were not and will not be implemented quickly enough and must be accompanied by a change in the entire electricity design with appropriate storage options. Pending this implementation Bridging technologies are needed, which on the one hand should serve to ensure security of supply in the short term, sustainably and cost-effectively and on the other hand introduce the climate protection mechanisms that are fundamentally needed. Nuclear power is judged by large parts of science as an unsustainable source of energy, but at best as a bridging technology. Nuclear fusion will remain a vision of the future for a long time and will not be available in the short term. In order to quickly bring the technology up to a level that can create a short-term, cost-effective solution that can be considered sustainable, the generation of electricity from, for example, biogenic methane gas is a target-oriented technology that has the key features mentioned above:

1. A way of utilizing CO2 extracted from the system of nature, via the transformation of land-based biomass or algal biomass from the sea into methane gas by bacteria, fungi or yeast, where the absorption mechanism of the extraction of atmospheric CO2 by the seawater surface trap is a quasi has unlimited scalability and, as a natural carbon capture mechanism in this process chain, ensures efficient, inexpensive and scalable CO2 removal from the air due to the large sea surface and the CO2 diffusing from the air into the sea in the form of hydrocarbons from macroalgae or any other Biomass, land-based or sea-based, binds.

2. The generation of electricity from methane or methanol, for example, with the help of pure oxygen, among other things, not only delivers maximum efficiency in terms of energy yield, but also almost pure CO2 as exhaust gas for "feeding" the microalgae produced afterwards.

3. A material production from CO2, with the help of the production of the oil from the microalgae - if necessary. in combination with fungi, yeast and bacteria for increasing the efficiency of the algal oil yield - which binds the future required amounts of carbon, which must be removed from the earth system, with the help of carbon-fibre-based materials, which in combination with mineral materials such as stone and concrete create a permanent carbon sink as described in IPCC SRI.5 in Chapter 4.3.4.2. At the same time, these replace the CCh-intensive building materials such as steel and concrete, so they have a double benefit. The state of the art describes processes with which fuels such as biodiesel or kerosene and carbon-fiber-based building materials are obtained either through the production of biomass, for example through algae growth with sequestered or natural CO2, or these industrially relevant substances with the help of Fischer-Tropsch synthesis sequestered CO2 and hydrogen can be obtained. Both processes are technically possible, but have different levels of efficiency and the associated different costs. However, both methods do not yet provide a satisfactory removal of CO2 from the atmosphere, which, however, as described in the IPCC SRI .5, is mandatory in order to meet the 1.5°C target.

All extraction methods available today are too energy-intensive to be seriously considered in the short term.

At this point, a bridging technology is needed, which is initially based on fossil gas power generation, but which can also be cost-effectively converted into sustainable use of these gas power plants.

A useful way of limiting global warming is the conversion of CO2, which comes from natural sources, into materials and building materials, as described in PCT/EP2009/008497, if the problem of removing CO2 from the earth system in the atmosphere and/or the sea is released. Previous CO2 sequestration measures do not make sense at the beginning of such a new material production process chain, not only because the energy costs are too high, but also because investing in such technology ties up funds that are urgently needed for simpler and more targeted ones at the beginning of such a transformation solutions are needed. It can therefore be assumed that a sensible use of methane gas or alkanes, as well as alcohols, generally prepares the processes required later right from the start, without the costs for these energy production systems having to be made several times, which also applies to the entire infrastructure required for this. On the one hand, electrolysers, which are used to generate hydrogen as energy storage for wind and PV power, as well as a bridging technology are needed such as natural gas power plants and on the other hand scalable solutions for storing electrical energy are almost completely absent, it stands to reason that investing in algae-based technology is a way out that can work in the form of energy storage for gas-fired power plants when existing fishing fleets are converted, who collect macroalgae carpets floating on the world's oceans, ship them ashore, where with the help of this biomass, bacteria, fungi or yeasts are used to produce biogas, which is used to generate electricity and to produce carbon fibers, and possibly a certain amount at the beginning of biodiesel and biokerosene still required for shipping and aviation. The same can happen on land, with unused biomass from forests, fields, meadows and private gardens that are not used for food production, as well as any currently discarded and unused food. The measures described above are not pointless investments if they are initially operated as a bridging technology with fossil natural gas, which after all initially replaces the significantly more COa-intensive coal-fired power plants and, through carbon fiber production, ensure that this fossil carbon does not and never returns to the atmosphere reached. Thanks to the help of the cheap and scalable removal of CO2 from the sea via the macroalgae, this process chain will become so inexpensive over time that CO2 removal will pay off in terms of costs for the first time, natural gas can be replaced and gas-fired power plants become really green and develop sustainable technology.

Biomass tanks are needed in which the proliferating macroalgae carpets collected in the sea ferment, since the required CO2 can be obtained or sequestered from these sources much more cheaply than directly from the air, which only has a comparatively low CO2 concentration and the atmosphere only with a high expenditure of energy can be found. The CO2 that is also produced during fermentation can also be collected and used to produce the microalgae for carbon fiber production. In this way, CO2 becomes a raw material that can and must be used in all process chains. In this way, the carbon previously bound in the CO2 from the atmosphere and sea surface system is permanently removed and bound in the carbon fiber building material, since carbon fibers are inert and the material can be stored in a repository. In this way, a net negative carbon flux can be established to serve as a COi sink without destroying the existing chemical, construction and energy business models. A business area is also opening up for the fishing industry, which is making less and less of a living from fishing and can convert to catching and fermenting seaweed.

As in the patents cited above, the carbon fibers are transformed into high-strength building materials together with concrete and/or natural stone with the aid of resins or other binders. These therefore form a highly efficient carbon sink, since the carbon fiber consists of almost 96% pure carbon.

The carbon fiber is applied to stone slabs in the form of fabrics or fabrics or introduced into concrete slabs in the form of carbon stone lamellae, which can be peeled off the stone slabs again after use without any problems and can then be taken to carbon repository. This creates a long-term sink for CO2, or the carbon that once formed CO2, just as nature did over millions of years with coal, oil and natural gas. During the production and especially when cutting the stone slabs from, for example, basalt or gabbro, considerable amounts of stone mud are produced, which can be weathered. During this weathering (enhanced weathering of stone, EWS), a lot of additional CO2 is bound, which can be included in the overall balance together with the carbon of the carbon fiber as a CC>2 sink in order to determine the CO2 absorption potential. This weathered rock material can then either be introduced into the earth system as fertilizer on fields, meadows and forests, or serve as an additive for concrete and sand substitutes, thus providing a double benefit by removing CO2 from the atmosphere without incurring additional costs. The type of rock determines the right one Use because not all hard rocks are suitable for fertilization, but can serve better as an aggregate for concrete.

This concrete can also be reinforced in such a way that carbon fiber stone layers or lamellas replace the previously used steel, in that the stone layers create the mechanical bridge between carbon fiber and concrete, as described in EPI 8830382, using the natural stone as an intermediate layer between carbon and concrete arranged provides the necessary flexibility and the most suitable temperature expansion behavior as an intermediary between the completely different materials carbon fiber and concrete.

Claims

patent claims

1) Carbon fibers, characterized in that the carbon required for the production of the carbon fibers comes from the CO2, which comes from the combustion of methane, ethane, methanol, ethanol or another higher-value alkane or alcohol, the carbon fibers being combined with mineral materials form a pressure-resistant and/or tensile building and/or construction material.

2) Carbon fibers according to claim 1, characterized in that the carbon required for the production of the carbon fibers consists of the CO2, which is produced during the combustion of methane, ethane, methanol, ethanol or a higher-value alkane or alcohol, the CO2 being the exhaust gas Gas turbine or a fuel cell is taken, which is used to generate electricity.

3) Carbon fibers according to claim 1 and 2, characterized in that the oxygen required for the combustion of methane, ethane, methanol, ethanol or a higher alkane or alcohol is taken from the electrolysis with non-regenerative or regenerative power sources.

4) Carbon fibers according to claims 1 to 3, characterized in that the alkane or alcohol burned in the turbine or fuel cell is obtained from land-based biomass or sea-based biomass that has been fermented with the aid of bacteria, fungi or yeasts.

5) Carbon fibers according to claim 1 to 4, characterized in that the sea-based biomass consists of macroalgae.

6) Carbon fiber according to claims 1 to 5, characterized in that the CO2 emitted during the generation of electricity according to claim 2 is used to produce microalgae.

7) Carbon fiber according to claims 1 to 5, characterized in that the CO2 emitted during the fermentation of the biomass is used to produce microalgae. 8) Carbon fibers according to claims 1 to 7, characterized in that polyacrylonitrile for carbon fiber production is produced from the oil of the microalgae.

9) Carbon fibers according to Claims 1 to 8, characterized in that polyacrylonitrile for carbon fiber production is produced from the oil which is produced during the fermentation of the macroalgae with the aid of bacteria, fungi or yeasts.

10) Carbon fibers according to spoke 1 to 9, characterized in that the polyacrylonitrile for the carbon fiber production from the CO2 from the gas power plant or the fuel cell is obtained together with the hydrogen from the electrolysis of excess wind power using the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis, according to previously performed water gas shift reaction to obtain CO from the CO2 for the production of methanol, which is further processed via propylene and acrylonitrile to polyacrylonitrile and finally to carbon fiber.

11) Carbon fibers according to Claims 1 to 10, characterized in that the minerals associated with the carbon fibers consist of natural stone or concrete or a combination of concrete and natural stone, in particular in a formation of stone-carbon-fibre-stone layers that permanently reinforces the concrete.

12) Carbon fibers according to claims 1 to 11, characterized in that the minerals associated with the fiber consist of basalt or gabbro rock.

13) Carbon fibers according to claim 1 to 12, characterized in that the concrete connected to the carbon fiber consists in part of weathered hard rock, basalt or gabbro rock.

14) Carbon fibers according to claims 1 to 13, characterized in that the carbon fibers are bonded or glued to the minerals with the aid of high-temperature-resistant binders made of water glass, silicone resins or silicate resins.

15) Carbon fibers according to claim 1 to 14, characterized in that the carbon fibers are separated after use by peeling from the mineral materials and disposed of.