A review on clean ammonia as a potential fuel for power generators

Abstract

This review focuses on the use of renewable ammonia for power generation applications and discusses options to convert industrial-grade generators to run on ammonia fuel. The different methods to produce clean ammonia are also discussed in terms of possible advantages and challenges from socio-economic, energetic and environmental perspectives. The main aim of using clean fuel sources, such as ammonia and hydrogen, is to achieve higher sustainability and low carbon emissions compared to conventional fuels. In addition, the present review comparatively assesses and discusses methods for clean ammonia synthesis based on their technical, economic and environmental performance criteria. Numerous potential strategies to improve the clean ammonia production methods are also explored, namely, liquid-electrolyte based systems, composite-membrane based systems, solid-state electrolyte, ceramic/inorganic proton-conducting solid electrolyte based systems, polymer-membrane based systems, O2 conducting-membrane based systems, and molten salt based electrochemical systems. Furthermore, some potential methods to convert various types of commercially available generators to be able to ammonia are proposed and discussed based on the experimental work carried out in the field.