Early-Stage Evaluation of Catalyst Manufacturing Cost and Environmental Impact Using CatCost

Journal Article · Thu Mar 31 04:00:00 EDT 2022 · Nature Catalysis

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1038/s41929-022-00759-6· OSTI ID:1863770

Van Allsburg, Kurt M.; Tan, Eric C. D.; Super, John D.; Schaidle, Joshua A.; Baddour, Frederick G.

The costs and environmental impacts of catalyst manufacture are often neglected during early-stage research because of a lack of accessible, standardized tools to assess them. Here we report the key features of CatCost, a free and public estimation tool for the evaluation of catalyst cost. We demonstrate its functionality with a case study of diverse catalysts (ZSM-5, Pt/TiO2 and Mo2C) for the catalytic fast pyrolysis of biomass. We quantified the economic and environmental improvements made by replacing circulating-bed ZSM-5 with more stable, fixed-bed Pt/TiO2 and Mo2C catalysts, while revealing the effects of synthesis methods and production scale on catalyst costs. The manufacture of ZSM-5 had a large processing cost contribution that was strongly scale dependent, whereas the costs of the other catalysts were dominated by raw materials at all scales. Furthermore, while ZSM-5 costs the least per kilogram, the more stable catalysts cost half as much per gallon of fuel.

• Research Organization: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Bioenergy Technologies Office (EE-3B)
• DOE Contract Number: AC36-08GO28308
• OSTI ID: 1863770
• Report Number(s): NREL/JA-5100-75030; MainId:6200; UUID:47a69df8-6be1-e911-9c26-ac162d87dfe5; MainAdminID:64314
• Journal Information: Nature Catalysis, Journal Name: Nature Catalysis Vol. 5
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

BIOMASS FUELS,ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY
TCPL
catalysis
catalyst
catalyst cost
techno-economic analysis