Cleantech Workshop San Diego June 09 University of Southampton: overview of expertise, track record and aspirations.

Cleantech Workshop San Diego June 09University of Southampton: overview of expertise, track record and aspirations

Outline• Clean/renewable energy technologies

(SUnRISE)- bioenergy- energy in the built environment/buildings- microgeneration- wind- wave, tidal and low head hydropower- gas hydrates- fuel cells and storage- clean combustion

• Other areas of interest

Bioenergy

• Joint Research Council funded project on Energy production on farms through anaerobic digestion (£0.75M, 2007-10) www.AD4RD.soton.ac.uk

• EU FP6 CROPGEN: Renewable Energy from Crops and Agro-wastes (2.5 M€, 2004-7). 12 partners in 6 countries www.cropgen.soton.ac.uk

• Focus on integrated farming systems for sustainable food and fuel production

• Integration with biorefineries and aquatic biomass production

fuellabour

machineryfertiliserspraysseed

biomass

anaerobic digester

mac

hine

rysi

los,

bui

ldin

gsco

nst

ruct

ion

biogas

digestatedigestate

fuel

mac

hine

ry

construction

electricity

heat

construction

boundary

electricity

heatbiomass

production

CHP

storage tanks

fuellabour

machineryfertiliserspraysseed

biomass

anaerobic digester

mac

hine

rysi

los,

bui

ldin

gsco

nst

ruct

ion

biogas

digestatedigestate

fuel

mac

hine

ry

construction

electricity

heat

construction

boundary

electricity

heatbiomass

production

CHP

storage tanks

Energy from biomass

Bioenergy• Use of trees for second generation

lignocellulosic feedstock for heat, power and liquid transportation

– Genetic improvement– Environmental sustainability – LCA , biodiversity,

water, climate change– Whole system research

• Recent Funding £ 4.5 million– UKERC Funding – Bioenergy – Member of The Porter Alliance for Bioenergy– TSEC-BIOSYS – Whole Systems analysis of UK

Bioenergy– FP6 Funding - POPYOMICS– FP6 – EVOLTREE– FP7 Funding – ENERGYPOPLAR– Department of Energy, DEFRA, BBSRC

http://www.sbs.soton.ac.uk/staff/gt/gt.php

Energy from municipal and industrial wastes

• >£1.5M funding in past 4 years (Defra, EPSRC)

• Focus on AD process optimisation for energy production and digestate quality: kinetic studies, microbiology, modelling

• From laboratory studies to monitoring of full-scale plants (Biocycle)

• Leading role in evaluating resource recovery potential from food wastes and establishing mass and energy balances

• Future plans include improved fundamental understanding of factors causing process instability in high-nitrogen wastes

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

week

Bio

ga

s m

3 we

ek

-1,

VS

re

mo

va

l %

an

d V

FA

g l-1

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

pH

an

d V

S l

oa

din

g k

g m

-3 d

-1

VS removal VFA Biogas VS loading pH

Algal biomass

• Wide expertise across the university relevant to bioalgae for biofuel

– Biology, Molecular Biology, Marine Biology

– Oceanography

– Process engineering

– Environmental Sciences

• Huge global potential to exploit algae - Southampton is UK-leading

Energy in the Built Environment: buildings

Energy in the Built Environment:Façade Systems / Refurbishment / Monitoring / Surveys / Eco-cities

www.energy.soton.ac.uk/ccweathergen

Climate Change:Climate Weather File Generation Tool - CCWeatherGen

Energy in the Built Environment: transport

CiViTAS – sustainable transport in cities

• EU initiative supporting European cities to install cleaner and more energy efficient transport

• Includes 59 cities across Europe involving over 700 transport measures. These include:

• Energy efficiency in public transport fleets (25 measures)• Hybrid & electric vehicles (22)• Biofuels and gas in public & private fleets (73)• Car pooling and sharing (39)• Walking and cycling (48)

• Fuel consumption can be improved 10-20% just by changing how a vehicle is driven

• Key areas to change are acceleration, gear changing and braking

• Other benefits relate to:

– Reduction in accidents

– Ride comfort

– Vehicle wear and tear

– CO2 and local air quality pollutants

• No overall increase in journey time

• Current advice on how to drive to reduce fuel consumption is generalised to cover all vehicles

Area of best fuel consumption

Emission rates of CO2 for two contrasting driving styles

170.

06

178.

88

138.

63

178.

59

181.

23

175.

67

172.

66187.

72

188.

81

240.

75

224.

78

125.

48

111.

39

82.4

698.2

2

121.

67

133.

76

134.

74

112.

24

118.

90

0

50

100

150

200

250

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 10 11Route segment number

Ave

rage

em

issi

on r

ate

(g k

m-1

)

Aggressive driving Passive driving

Energy in the Built Environment: microgeneration

> 5kWp< 5kWp

Microgeneration:UK Micro Wind Trial / Urban Microgeneration

Standalone PVTransport refrigeration,Developing country applications

Solar Cell Development

Grid Connected PV & WindFull economic value,Building Integrated PV – multi function – offset cost

Other Research AreasMatching generation with demand, social impacts of technology, user behaviour

PV generation and electricity demand

Microgeneration: photovoltaic and wind

High-efficiency low-cost photovoltaics

• Photonic structures • Light harvesting and

biomimetics• Fluorescent energy collectors• Third-generation solar cells• Thermodynamics of light

www.soton.ac.uk/~solar

Supported by

• National Solar Test and Reference Facility ( )

• Microgrids and system integration of microgenerators

• Stand alone PV and hybrid systems• PV system design for developing

countries

www.soton.ac.uk/~solar

Microgeneration system design & integration

Wind power

• Quantifying the resource• Environmental impacts• Bird strikes• Social acceptability• Materials and structures

Wind turbines: capabilities

Wind turbines: capabilities

• Aeroacoustics• Tribology (nCATS)• Design optimisation• Foundations• Grid connection

Wind energy: projects• Data management for COWRIE-Collaborative

Offshore Wind Research Into the Environment

• Vestas Technology Ltd/SEEDA: unsteady aerodynamic gust response and noise

• Lloyd’s Register UTC in Hydrodynamics, Hydroelasticity and Mechanics of Composites

• ISSC Committee V4 on Ocean Wind and Wave Energy

• With RAL on application of infra-red and acoustic emission techniques to blades and Aalborg University on thermal degradation of sandwich structures

• Electrical Systems and Subsea Cables –SUPERGEN

• Structural Health Monitoring and Corrosion protection –national centre for advanced tribology

COWRIE – data management for the offshore renewable energy sector

Wave, tidal and low head hydropower

Harnessing Ocean Energy: Wave Energy

Wave Resource Assessment

The use of satellite altimeter data to predict wave resources at appropriate site (in collaboration with NOCS).

Energy yields for the Pelamis wave energy converter (in collaboration with PWP Ltd)

Fundamental Studies of Device and Array Design

Wave energy device optimisation though CFD simulations and model scale testing (OWEL)

Farm configurations and Device / Device interactions

Analysis of farm configurations and layouts

Proximity effects- device / device interaction

Energy yields in farm, and model testing

ANACONDA: all-rubber MW wave power device• A flooded rubber tube in the water, anchored head

to sea, designed so that the speed of bulge waves matches the speed of water waves.

The Carbon Trust’s independent

consultants give Anaconda their full

approval.

Their cost estimate: 6.6p per kWh,

much lower that all rival systems.

ANACONDA: all-rubber MW wave power device• Dimensions of a 1MW Anaconda: 200m long, 7m

diameter, 12cm wall

• Research on the highly novel hydrodynamics of the Anaconda at Southampton is supported by

– EPSRC (2008-10), – Atkins – Checkmate SeaEnergy

• www.bulgewave.comwww.checkmateuk.com/seaenergy

Ecohydraulics

• Small, meso, and mega-scale hydropower development

• Current funded projects:

- EU low-head hydropower

- Swedish Hydropower Industry

- Environment Agency

- EPSRC / ESRC

Gas hydrates

Gas hydrate – A new energy source?• Hydrates – an ice-like compound, found only in restricted conditions,

such as Artic or deep ocean sediments – recently found in Eastern Margin of India

• Hydrate contains large volumes of methane gas that has the potential to be future energy resource –

• quantification and location of hydrate uncertain - How can this potential be realised?

Burning hydrate sample Recovered samples of hydrate X-ray image of recovered sample (Off India)

Assessment of physical properties – help understand impact of gas hydrates• World leading research on

dynamic properties of hydrate bearing soils

– laboratory testing of both artificial and natural sediments

– numerical modelling of large scale behaviour

• International research collaborations with

– National Oceanographic Centre, Fugro McClelland Geoscience (USA), Geotek (UK), Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (India), CISRO (Australia)

Hydrate sample in Gas hydrate resonant column apparatus

Fuel cells and storage

Fuel Cells

• Development of Pt-M catalysts for oxygen reduction and hydrogen oxidation in PEM fuel cells (Johnson Matthey/EPSRC)

• Production and characterization of novel, high surface area platinum deposits on MEAs (Johnson Matthey/EPSRC)

• Synthesis and characterization of titanium dioxide nanotubes and their Metallization (Royal Society)

• Development of Biofuel cells (Dstl/EPSRC)

• Improvements in Borohydride Fuel Cells (DStl)

• Reaction Engineering Environment in Redox Flow cells (Regenesys Technologies)

Accelerated Discovery of Lithium Battery Materials (GR/S27238/01)• Novel low temperature synthesis

of LiFePO4 materials

• High Throughput Measurements for material optimisation

• Results show 90% energy recovery during charge/discharge cycle

• This shows that the Li-ion battery is the most efficient way of storing energy on the large scale

64 cells under test

Composition

perf

orm

anc

e

3D batteries for shape flexibility

electrode materials

current collectorselectrodeposited membrane

Ni foam substrate Coated with MnO2 Coated with membrane

Stages in 3D battery formation on nickel foam - forms battery of any size or shape !

• FP7 Superlion: Uppsala, Amiens, Soton,

Toulouse, Paris, Phillips, Varta, St Jude,

Spinouts arising from EPSRC projects

Liquid crystal template nanotechnologyFor batteries and supercapacitors

High throughput materials screening For H storage and fuel cells.

1.5 m£8M capital, 17 employees

£10M capital, 25 employees

Contracts from TSB, Shell, Toyota

Clean combustion

Clean Combustion Technologies: from W to GW

• Biomass combustion• Coal combustion• Hydrogen combustion• Oxy-fuel combustion• High-efficiency hybrid combustion systems• Multi-scale modelling

37

Southampton leads UK Combustion Consortium:EPSRC grant No. EP/D080223/1 (2006 - 2009)EPSRC grant No. GR/R66197/01 (2002 - 2005)

Gas Turbine – Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Hybrid Power System EPSRC grant No. EP/E011640/1 (2007 - 2010)

38

Gas Turbine: 35% efficiency Solid Oxide Fuel Cell: 45 % efficiency

Hybrid System: 70% efficiency

Discrete Particle Modelling of Fluidised Beds EPSRC grant No. EP/G034281/1 (2009 - 2012)

39

•Multi-scale modelling of fluid flow, heat transfer and combustion

•Simultaneous, repetitive fragmentation and incremental breakage included

• Mass, momentum and energy conserved during break-up

Other technologies/areas

• Ground source heat pump

• Water resource management

• Adapting to climate change (Living with Environmental Change)

• Remediation of contaminated land

• High speed rail

Unrivalled testbed sites……

Eco Island Project

Cleantech ResearchAt the University of Southampton

• Bioenergy• Built Environment• Transport• Microgeneration• Wind• Wave• Tidal•Low head hydropower • Gas hydrates

• Fuel cells• Storage• Clean combustion• Testbed sites• Ground source heat pumps• Water• Contaminated land• High speed rail