Minnova Corp. announced positive particle tracking velocimetry results of the DUMA technology. The tests were conducted by University of L'Aquila (Italy) and support the development of planned demonstration plant in Swan River, Manitoba and other future commercial development sites in Europe and central America.

The DUMA 3rd generation gasification design builds on existing fluidized bed gasification technology but incorporates patent pending design and operational features that enable high throughput to produce a high hydrogen content syngas. Two floor standing cold model units were built by DUMA at the beginning of 2022 to experiment different configurations and working parameters. Velocimetry tests analysed the trajectories of the bed particle images acquired with a high-speed and high-resolution camera and processed by software that uses pixel-by-pixel analysis with a preprocessing step of background subtraction and thresholding segmentation.

This analysis enables engineering team to reconstruct the velocity and distribution of the entrained biomass particles inside the bed reactor. Velocimetry test results were positive, indicating a biomass flow rate of the DUMA 3rd generation gasification system up to 375% higher than existing technology. This is a remarkable achievement and represents a truly significant advancement in fluidized bed gasification technology that can result in higher initial syngas hydrogen content (over 50% H2), lower green hydrogen production costs, smaller plant footprint and lower capital costs of the entire production plant.

In addition to positive test results, it is announced that gasification test work has begun on selected corn residues from Romania and tropical fruit residues from Costa Rica. Gasification test work is being conducted at The University of Teramo (Italy) with results and reports expected by the end of August 2022. These results combined with planned demonstration plant in Swan River, MB will inform engineering and design for commercial scale plants.

The goal is to accelerate commercial scale development, in targeted jurisdictions, during 2023 to achieve green hydrogen production by 2025 or earlier. Minnova Renewable Energy is actively advancing green hydrogen production initiative in Canada, Romania, and Costa Rica, to start. Any jurisdiction with abundant sustainable biomass can be targeted by highly efficient 3rd generation biomass gasification technology with a view to build a global development and production pipeline.

Looking to Europe and in particular Germany, infrastructure development to support hydrogen in mobility applications (i.e., hydrogen fuel stations) is well advanced with 96 hydrogen fueling stations offering convenience and short refuelling times of less than 3 minutes. An additional 36 hydrogen fuelling stations are under development in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. The energy transition utilizing hydrogen is well underway.

More information on European hydrogen for mobility applications can be found atH2 Mobility. They note recent retail price reported for hydrogen from H2 Mobility fuel stations in Germany is currently over €12.00 per kg, up from 9.50 per kg as recently as March 2022.