Pilot-Scale CO<sub>2</sub> Electrolysis Enables a Semi-empirical Electrolyzer Model
Jonathan P. Edwards, Théo Alerte, Colin P. O’Brien, Christine M. Gabardo, Shijie Liu, Joshua Wicks, Adriana Gaona, Jehad Abed, Yurou Celine Xiao, Daniel Young, Armin Sedighian Rasouli, Amitava Sarkar, Shaffiq A. Jaffer, Heather L. MacLean, Edward H. Sargent, David Sinton
Abstract
Carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) electrolysis powered with renewable electricity can help close the carbon cycle by converting emissions into chemicals and fuels. Two key advancements are required to bridge the technological gaps for industrial implementation: pilot plant demonstrations with detailed performance data; and chemical engineering process models built and tested with lab- and pilot-scale data. Here, we develop a semi-empirical electrolyzer model in Aspen Custom Modeler which is trained on a 5 cm 2 lab-scale CO 2 electrolyzer. We then scale to a pilot-scale 800 cm 2 single cell and 10 × 800 cm 2 stack and use the results to validate the model; at 100 mA cm –2, the model can predict six of seven cell performance metrics within 16% absolute error and three of five stack metrics within 11% absolute error. With the combination of the electrolyzer model and the pilot-scale data, this work provides the prerequisites for further scaling of CO 2 electrolysis.