Challenges in capturing thermal energy from byproducts
In an industry dominated by fossil fuel and resistive boilers for steam production, AtmosZero, a innovative manufacturing company, is offering a competitive alternative through modular industrial heat pumps.
Industrial heat pumps have remained a niche solution due to the focus on waste heat recovery and the challenges associated with capturing and upgrading heat. Waste heat recovery, a method used to capture excess heat produced by industrial plants for cost and efficiency purposes, has been a topic of interest for many years. However, according to a paper published in the journal Joule by Addison Stark and co-author Gregory Thiel, waste heat recovery has struggled to scale for decades and will not clear its hurdles any time soon.
Major industrial players such as ArcelorMittal and Cemex have deployed waste heat recovery projects into their facilities, but the unique engineering requirements for each recovery project make it difficult for a company to replicate success across multiple sites, limiting cost reductions and deployment speed.
AtmosZero's approach to industrial heat pumps skips waste heat recovery, marketing its product as a cheaper, drop-in solution that avoids custom engineering. Stark, the CEO of AtmosZero, believes that the pursuit of heat recovery is a distraction from more solvable challenges in industrial decarbonization.
The challenges of waste heat recovery include the need for larger heat exchangers at lower temperatures, making it expensive to capture efficiently. Companies like Siemens, Johnson Controls, and Honeywell have worked on improving thermal management scalability by developing modular heat exchanger systems, advanced cooling technologies, and integrated smart control solutions to address efficiency and scalability challenges in heat dissipation systems.
Despite the challenges, waste heat recovery is not exclusive to the industrial sector. Data centers are also implementing waste heat recovery projects. However, AtmosZero's industrial heat pump solution aims to avoid the complex engineering requirements associated with waste heat recovery projects.
AtmosZero's industrial heat pump technology requires a minimum temperature of 100 degrees Celsius to deliver steam, positioning it as a cost-effective alternative to traditional methods of steam production. The company's technology does not rely on waste heat recovery, setting it apart from traditional methods.
Stark expressed his views on this topic in a podcast called Catalyst, hosted by Shayle Kann. Companies like Siemens, Ormat, and Kawasaki Heavy Industries offer waste heat recovery systems, but AtmosZero's innovative approach could potentially revolutionize the industry.
Approximately 30% of industrial heat in the U.S. is accounted for by industrial steam. With AtmosZero's modular industrial heat pumps offering a competitive and cost-effective solution, the future of steam production in the industrial sector may be on the cusp of a significant shift.
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