Biomass to bio/E-methanol by Breakthrough SOEC-based Process: the BeBOP innovation

Methanol is a crucial commodity in the chemical sector and a potential building block of the future sustainable chemical industry.

To date, the majority of methanol is produced from fossil fuels (either natural gas or coal) with associated CO2 emissions of 0.3 Gt/year (about 10% of total chemical sector emissions). Biomass is a sustainable alternative to conventional hydrocarbon feedstocks.

However, due to its high carbon and oxygen content, conventional second-generation biomass-to-methanol processes achieve 40-45% of carbon efficiency and result in venting most of the carbon back to the atmosphere as CO2.BeBOP is a 4-year project that aims to develop a novel versatile, disruptive, and multi-product biomass and power to methanol plant, that can transform the methanol industry.

Thanks to the integration of an electrolysis cell within the syngas conditioning line, the BeBOP concept can double the methanol productivity ans achieve >95% of total carbon efficiency and recover high value components from biomass gasification residues.The BeBOP project will showcase a first-of-a-kind TRL6 pilot plant ready to be scaled-up and replicated by the European biomass-based industry.

BeBOP will enhance market opportunities in the short to medium term bringing the methanol production costs below 250 €/t (with long-term low-cost renewable electricity and including 150 €/tCO2 carbon credits) and shifting the 10% of the production from fossil-based to BeBOP configuration allowing to avoid the emission of more than 30 Mt of CO2 per year (3% of CO2 emissions in chemical industry).

Preserving the quality of the end product at competitive costs, decreasing the GHG emissions, decreasing the costs of methanol production and creating new direct and indirect jobs, BeBOP will have a decisive impact in increasing the circularity of the European chemical sector.