IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/masfgc/v28y2023i8d10.1007_s11027-023-10090-5.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Techno-economic assessment of atmospheric CO2-based carbon fibre production enabling negative emissions

Author

Listed:
  • Dominik Keiner

    (LUT University)

  • Andreas Mühlbauer

    (OTH Regensburg)

  • Gabriel Lopez

    (LUT University)

  • Tuomas Koiranen

    (LUT University)

  • Christian Breyer

    (LUT University)

Abstract

The fight against global warming requires novel approaches for the defossilisation of industrial processes, and the limitation of global warming requires options for negative carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. The production of carbon fibre (CF) is an energy-intensive chain of processes which cause CO2 emissions. Having in mind the high market growth for CF composite materials, CF production might stand against the fight against global warming. CF also offers a huge mitigation opportunity, as CF contain up to 95–98wt% of pure carbon. This study investigates possible ways to link CF production to atmospheric CO2, enabling negative CO2 emissions through CF manufacturing. Production value chains for CF based on poly(acrylonitrile) (PAN) and pitch, the two most important CF precursor materials, are developed and analysed regarding their energy and mass balances. The PAN value chain is further assessed regarding a first economic estimation of CF production cost with atmospheric CO2 as carbon source. The results show that production costs per ton CO2 removed might be unattractive at 2949 €/tCO2 in 2050. However, from a CF perspective, production cost of 10.3 €/kgCF in 2050 might enable a business case for electricity-based CF production from atmospheric CO2 in the future. Each ton of CF produced can store about 3.5 tCO2 due to a very high carbon share in the final product. With an increasing market for CF, a total negative emission potential of at least 0.7 GtCO2 per year can be enabled by 2050. Further research opportunities are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Dominik Keiner & Andreas Mühlbauer & Gabriel Lopez & Tuomas Koiranen & Christian Breyer, 2023. "Techno-economic assessment of atmospheric CO2-based carbon fibre production enabling negative emissions," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 28(8), pages 1-29, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:masfgc:v:28:y:2023:i:8:d:10.1007_s11027-023-10090-5
    DOI: 10.1007/s11027-023-10090-5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11027-023-10090-5
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11027-023-10090-5?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:masfgc:v:28:y:2023:i:8:d:10.1007_s11027-023-10090-5. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.