The Need: Carbon Reduction and Fuel Cells

Carbon dioxide is increasingly notorious as a cause of global warming and a burden to industrial producers under increasing regulatory scrutiny. Apart from the obvious solutions of energy conservation and carbon sequestration (recovery and burial of CO2) ERC offers a safe, viable and solution to mitigate and profit from CO2 generated from fossil fuel combustion. While the increasing cost and scarcity of fossil fuels renders competing processes for converting CO2 less and less desirable, and while carbon sequestration does not offer a renewable solution, ERC’s compatibility with carbon neutral energy supplies
makes it an attractive strategy for industrial producers struggling to meet regulatory caps on CO2 emissions. 

The international market for carbon dioxide management is currently in the US$ billions annually and carbon emissions credits are traded at values of up to US$40 per ton of CO2. In addition to the numerous existing applications of ERC produced formic acid (feedstock preservatives, de-icing solutions, baking soda to name a few) the rapid development of direct formic acid fuel cells (DFAFCs) is likely to be a significant commercially valuable use of formic acid. DFAFCs are gaining popularity over hydrogen and methanol based fuel cells because of their ease of refueling, efficiency, and safety. An emerging technology, DFAFCs are currently being tested by major producers of portable electronics in phones, laptops and computers. With continued development there is potential for DFAFCs to challenge traditional batteries as power sources for mobile electronic devices. Large scale applications of DFAFC technology are expected to follow. Sodium formate and formic acid are the primary products of the ERC process and both will fuel DFAFCs. 

Yet another new application is the use of ammonium formate as an additive to diesel fuel (it reduces the NOx emissions). Truck and car manufacturers in Europe and Japan are testing it now – it could be a future large market. The ERC process can be adapted to produce ammonium formate.