Identifying Commercial Opportunities for the Reverse Water Gas Shift Reaction

Abstract

The reverse water gas shift (RWGS) reaction is a promising technology for introducing carbon dioxide as feedstock to the broader chemical industry through syngas production. While this reaction has attracted significant attention recently for catalyst and process development, there is a need to quantify the net CO2 consumption of RWGS schemes, while taking into account parameters such as thermodynamics, alongside technoeconomic constraints for feasible process development. Also of particular importance is the consideration of the cost and carbon footprint of hydrogen production. Herein, research needs to enable net carbon-consuming, economically feasible RWGS processes are identified. By considering the scenarios of hydrogen with varying carbon footprints (gray, blue, and green) as well as analyzing the sensitivity to process heating method, it is proposed that the biggest enabling development for RWGS commercial implementation as a CO2 utilization technology will be the availability of low-cost and low-carbon sources of hydrogen. RWGS catalyst improvements alone will not be sufficient for economic feasibility but are necessary given the prospect of dropping hydrogen prices.