The 2024 Turbomachinery Exposition took place in London in late June with 2,700 attendees. They showed up in large numbers for the opening keynote about accelerating net-zero via innovation.
Tim Lieuwen, Executive Director, Georgia Institute of Technology, kicked off the keynote by giving a realistic view of the role of the gas turbine in achieving net-zero. He made it clear that a net-zero world without gas turbines would be much more expensive unless you sacrifice reliability.
There is no serious competitor to the gas turbine in aviation. But that is not the case in electric power due to intermittent wind and solar,” said Lieuwen. “The reliability expectations of net-zero are locked into role of gas turbines.”
He said there would not be a place for the gas turbine in a net-zero world if 80% reliability was acceptable. But, as he pointed out, no advanced society would ever accept 80% or even 90% reliability.
The least-cost net zero system looks very different when you consider reliability. The existing natural gas and energy delivery infrastructure, he added, is a successful and efficient way to store and move energy around.
“Fuels, including natural gas and renewable gases, will realistically comprise 50% of energy in a net zero society. “They are great storage and delivery mechanism,” said Lieuwen. “It will be less expensive to arrive at net zero if you include reliable, firm and dispatchable natural gas.”
He accepts that the role of gas turbines will diminish over time as a primary source of energy. But further roles are evolving. Regional markets like CAISO in California and PJM in the Northeast, for example, pay for natural gas capacity, even though unused. They need it to be available should wind or solar resources fall off rapidly.
He was followed by Verena Klapdor, Senior VP of Siemens Energy, who also talked about affordability and reliability and how they must balance sustainability initiatives. Renewables are not there all the time, she said, and natural gas generation provides backup,
As an extreme example. North America recently lost 60 GW of solar power during a solar eclipse that lasted less than five minutes. A more everyday example, from the UK, involved 18 GW of renewable energy disappearing at certain times of the day; 20 GW of gas generation is available to handle such shortfalls.
“Innovation in gas turbines can help to accelerate the energy transition while balancing reliability, sustainability, and affordability,” said Klapdor.
The following day’s keynote attempted to address real-world achievements towards net-zero in propulsion and power. Seiichi Ibaraki, General Manager, Research & Innovation Center, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, said his company plans to cut CO2 emissions in half by 2030 and eliminate them altogether by 2040.
The company’s plan of action is built on three pillars:
- Decarbonizing the existing infrastructure
- Building a new hydrogen ecosystem
- Building a CO2 ecosystem.
He believes that gas turbines, boilers, and engines can eventually run on hydrogen and ammonia to bring gas turbines to net zero by 2030. Carbon capture will also play a role with MHI using the KM CDR process. “A key part of achieving these goals is connecting physical machines with digital technology,” said Ibaraki.
Mathias Andriamisaina, Head of Hydrogen Demonstrators at Airbus, outlined similar plans for aviation. The roadmap to hydrogen flight, though, is longer.
First, the company plans to use 100% sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) on commercial aircraft by 2030 and, by 2035, be the first major airplane manufacturer to offer hydrogen-powered commercial aircraft.
Complete decarbonization lies in the 2050 timeframe. “We are looking at cryogenic liquid hydrogen storage for most of our new aircraft, as well as designs for electric aircraft,” said Andriamisaina.
