India Launches Its First CO2-To-Methanol Pilot Plant In Pune
India has laid the foundation to achieve its net-zero carbon emissions plan by initiating the country’s first-of-its-kind CO2-to-Methanol pilot plant at Thermax Ltd.’s Research, Technology, and Innovation Center (RTIC) in Pune.
This project holds national significance as it aims to demonstrate CO2 capture and utilization (CCU) technologies and was supported by the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India. The foundation of the project was virtually laid by Abhay Karandikar, Secretary, DST on September 14.
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The IIT Delhi and Thermax Ltd. will collaborate to develop the CCU technology. The plant with an overall capacity of 1.4 Tons Per Day (TPD) has been designed considering CO2 emissions from a diverse range of sources, including power plants, cement and steel plants, fertilizer plants, and refineries. This project will be further carried out by a team of faculty members from the Department of Chemical Engineering at IIT Delhi, complementing the pilot plant activities through R&D for future developments.
The RTIC team at Thermax will scale up the laboratory-developed processes and demonstrate the technology at the pilot plant scale. This plant aims to leverage the industry-academia partnership, with novel products and processes evaluated in an industrial setting and feedback used for further optimization.
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This new plant, building on the success of a previous DST-supported coal-to-methanol pilot plant project, will capture CO2 from two key sources: (i) syngas produced during coal gasification, and (ii) flue gas from the combustion of carbonaceous fuels, and subsequently convert it to methanol.
The project is anticipated to serve as a design template for many industrial applications, building capacity and preparing indigenous manufacturers to meet future demands for catalysts, absorbents, solvents, and other technology solutions at a commercial scale.
