A Danish start-up has acquired recent backing for its new method of utilizing renewable vitality to make zero-emissions ammonia, a chemical essential in world agriculture however whose manufacturing it says presently creates as a lot CO2 as all the aviation business.
NitroVolt has raised €750,000 ($815,000) in a pre-seed spherical to develop its ‘Nitrolyzer’ unit that permits “cheaper and native manufacturing of ammonia” utilizing solely air, water and inexperienced vitality (see panel).
The spherical was led by Swedish enterprise capital fund BackingMinds, NitroVolt introduced immediately (Wednesday).
The beginning-up final yr acquired a grant from Breakthrough Vitality, the innovation fund of Microsoft founder Invoice Gates, to develop its know-how.
Half of the world’s agriculture depends on ammonia however NitroVolt stated that its dominant present manufacturing technique – which usually includes burning fossil fuels and extremely polluting gray hydrogen – emits 2% of world CO2 emissions.
That’s equal to all the aviation business.
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“The ammonia business can not hold polluting, and the entire business is underneath large strain to transition in direction of greener manufacturing strategies,” stated NitroVolt.
There are additionally geopolitical issues, stated NitroVolt, with Russia and China the biggest exporters of ammonia worldwide. Ammonia costs skyrocketed following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, whereas the West is in a interval of tense relations with China.
All of this creates a requirement for “native and inexperienced” ammonia manufacturing, stated NitroVolt.
NitroVolt is growing a know-how often known as a ‘lithium-mediated ammonia synthesis reactor’, being commercialised because the Nitrolyzer, that it says can “produce inexperienced ammonia immediately on the point-of-use; on the farm.”
The product will likely be a container-sized system, it stated, combining solely air, water, and renewable electrical energy.
The method occurring contained in the Nitrolyzer unit relies on the discount of lithium salt to metallic lithium, based on the corporate’s web site. This metallic lithium will then react with nitrogen to type a nitride. The nitride is well protonated by hydrogen sourced through water splitting. This results in the formation of ammonia, and the lithium is launched again into answer, to be recycled and begin the response once more.
The system “completely removes fossil fuels from the manufacturing course of, making their ammonia 100% renewable, carbon-free, and aggressive with present black ammonia costs available on the market.”
“Our know-how makes it attainable to supply ammonia domestically and places the tip consumer accountable for the manufacturing,” claimed Suzanne Zamany Andersen, CEO and co-founder of NitroVolt.
“Which means the manufacturing turns into resilient to produce chain volatility and inexperienced on the similar time – one thing that doesn’t exist available on the market immediately.”
