Thermo-economic optimisation of the integration of electrolysis in a wood to methane process

Converting wood to grid quality methane allows to distribute a CO2 free, renewable enery resource in a conventional energy distribution system and use it in transportation applications. Using a previously developed thermo–economic process model for thermochemical production of synthetic natural gas from wood and applying a multi–objective optimisation algorithm, the present paper assesses the prospect of integrating an electrolyser in the system. Due to an inherent lack of hydrogen for complete conversion of wood into methane, it is shown that electrolysis is a viable option for increasing the gas output, storage of electricity and production of fuel that further mitigates national CO2–emissions.