Assessment of hydrogen production from municipal solid wastes as competitive route to produce low-carbon H.

An economic and CO emission impact assessment of the production of H from municipal solid waste in the two configurations of retrofitting an existing waste to energy plant with an electrolysis unit (WtE + El) and of hydrogen production via waste gasification (WtH) is made with respect to reference cases of H production by steam reforming of methane (SMR) or of water electrolysis (El). The results are analyzed with reference to two scenarios depending on whether the fate of waste disposal emissions for SMR and El is accounted. The costs of H production as a function of waste gate fee and CO taxation as well as the CO emissions for both scenarios and the four cases of H production analyzed are reported. The results show that produce H from a WtE plant hybridized with an electrolyzer could be economic only when the plant is free from depreciation costs and no CO taxation exists. Conversely, WtH solution results preferable when CO taxation will be applied to the non-biogenic fraction of waste. Conditions when WtH may results competitive to SMR are defined, in terms of both cost of production and CO emissions. With respect to El case, WtH results more competitive under the assumption made in terms of combined costs and CO emissions.