Opening of the first factory to produce electronic fuel from solar energy and biogas

Sustainable fuel production using the sun and biogas – this is the idea of ​​​​a Swiss company. The world's first production facility has now been opened. However, there is still a long way to go before reaching industrial quantities.

The metal frames look like oversized satellite dishes: in the middle of a field near Jülich, a small town near Aachen, there are more than a hundred hexagonal mirrors several meters high, all aligned with the sun. They are arranged in a semicircle around a tower about 20 meters high.

What at first glance looks like a rather strange solar park, is actually the world's first industrial plant for producing solar fuel, built in a year and a half by the Swiss company Synhelion.

The idea: Using very high heat, so-called synthetic gas is first produced from carbon and water in a thermochemical reactor, which is then converted on-site into liquid synthetic crude oil. This liquid crude oil is easy to transport in standard drums and can be processed in conventional oil refineries to turn it into diesel, gasoline for cars or kerosene for aircraft – just like traditional fossil crude oil.

Temperatures up to 1500 degrees

Unlike current electric fuel stations (called “power-to-liquid”), which use electricity from solar or wind farms to generate very high heat inside the reactor, Sinhilion uses the sun itself to do this, and mirrors, all of which can be moved From a distance, all the sun's rays are focused on one point at the top of the tower.

There, the receiver is heated to 1,500 degrees, then transfers the heat to the reactor. That's why Synhelion calls its method “sun to liquid.” As a source of carbon required for the reactor, Synhelion relies on biogas from agricultural waste and production waste from the paper mill. In the long term, it should also be possible to extract carbon directly from the air.

The technology is based on research conducted at ETH Zurich, in which Synhelion co-founder and co-managing director Philipp Fürler also participated. Several major companies have now joined Synhelion as investors, including Lufthansa Group, Italian oil company Eni and plant manufacturer SMS.

Synthetic fuels are important for climate protection

Synthetic fuels (also called e-fuels or sustainable fuels) are an important part of the EU's climate protection plans. From 2025, all flights departing from an airport in the European Union must contain at least 2% synthetic fuel. By 2050, this percentage is expected to rise to more than 70 percent. In order to meet this demand, the production of synthetic fuels must be increased significantly. In addition, a special regulation to ban combustion engines from 2035 is being discussed, according to which it will remain possible to register only vehicles running on synthetic fuel after 2035.

“The world of the future will be electric. But it is relatively difficult to store electricity or transport it over long distances. That's why we need liquid synthetic fuels,” says Frank Atzler, Head of the Department of Internal Combustion Engines and Drive Systems at TU Dresden. .

The system in Jülich is experimental and experimental. It can only produce a few thousand liters of synthetic crude oil each year, also because there is not enough sun in Germany. The following facilities are already being planned: The first commercial production facility will be built in Spain from 2025. This project should then be able to produce 1,000 tons of fuel per year for the first time.