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Caterpillar
Collaborates with District Energy St. Paul to Demonstrate
Sustainability and Performance of Hydrogen-Fueled Combined Heat and
Power System
May,
2022
DEERFIELD, IL - Caterpillar Inc.
today announced a low-carbon-intensity fuel project with District
Energy St. Paul to demonstrate a 2.0 MW combined heat and power (CHP)
system fueled by various combinations of hydrogen and natural gas.
Supported and partially funded by the
U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Energy Efficiency and
Renewable Energy (EERE), the project will be led by Caterpillar in
collaboration with District Energy St. Paul and the National Renewable
Energy Laboratory (NREL).
With preparations starting in the second
quarter of this year and operations commencing in 2023, participants
will develop and demonstrate a hydrogen-fueled power delivery and
control system to evaluate its greenhouse gas emissions profile,
reliability, durability, and barriers to adoption. To fully assess
every aspect of the hydrogen solution under real-world operating
conditions, power and heat from the demonstration project will feed
into District Energy St. Paul’s distribution system.
“As a leading authority on CHP systems
and the deployment of advanced energy technologies that promote
sustainability, District Energy St. Paul is the ideal choice for
hosting this demonstration,” said Jason Kaiser, vice president for
Caterpillar’s Electric Power Division. “The project will help
Caterpillar further extend our expertise in hydrogen-fueled power
systems performing under the highest expectations of real-world
applications.”
For the demonstration project,
Caterpillar will deploy a flexible-fuel CHP system that includes the
Cat® Master Microgrid Controller (MMC) and a Cat G3516
generator set packaged in a standardized, factory-assembled solution
to minimize complexity and infrastructure requirements.
The MMC will manage load dispatch
requirements as the power system demonstrates the performance,
efficiency and emissions characteristics of a hydrogen-fueled
solution. Using 100% hydrogen fuel, 100% natural gas fuel, or natural
gas blended with up to 25% hydrogen, the project will compare how
hydrogen and hydrogen blends can be integrated into a
waste-heat-and-power solution.
Ziegler, the local Cat dealer, will
provide on-site support and system maintenance for the project.
Caterpillar’s Investment in
Hydrogen-Fueled Power
The demonstration project with District
Energy St. Paul and the NREL is the latest illustration of
Caterpillar’s advancements in hydrogen-fueled power solutions. The
company has begun offering demonstrator generator sets capable of
operating on 100% hydrogen, including fully renewable green hydrogen,
on a designed-to-order basis. The Cat G3516H gas generator set is
available in North America and Europe with a rating of 1250 kW for 50-
or 60-Hz continuous, prime, and load management applications.
Additionally, Caterpillar offers
commercially available power generation solutions from 400 kW to 4.5
MW that can be configured to operate on natural gas blended with up to
25% hydrogen. In the fourth quarter of this year, customers will be
able to order retrofit kits that provide blending capabilities up to
25% hydrogen for generator sets built on select engine platforms.
Also, Caterpillar has launched a
three-year project through a collaboration with Microsoft to
demonstrate a power system incorporating a large-format hydrogen fuel
cell to produce reliable and sustainable backup power for data
centers. The project is supported and partially funded by the DOE
under the H2@Scale initiative and backed by the NREL.
District Energy St. Paul’s Commitment
to Environmental Stewardship
District Energy St. Paul is a recognized
leader in environmental and energy sustainability, earning a Global
Sustainability award from the International Energy Agency and
recognition from the United Nations Environment Programme.
District Energy St. Paul is committed to
carbon neutrality by 2050 and has already made notable progress on
carbon reduction targets over the years, reducing carbon emissions by
68% between 2000 and 2021. This achievement was made possible by
increasing efficiency, enhancing customer building performance,
improving data and controls management, and upgrading production with
higher efficiency equipment.
The integration of renewable energy
through solar thermal and biomass-fired combined heat and power has
helped the system achieve nearly 50% carbon-free heat. In 2021,
District Energy, began offering carbon-neutral cooling to all
customers by offsetting scope 2 emissions associated with electricity
used to deliver chilled water to customer buildings through an
agreement to purchase renewable energy credits from projects in
Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Caterpillar’s Product Portfolio Can
Help Customers Meet their Sustainability Goals
The hydrogen CHP project is the latest
example of Caterpillar’s contribution to a reduced-carbon future
through continued investments in new products, technologies and
services. Caterpillar helps customers achieve their climate-related
goals by providing products that facilitate fuel transition, increased
operational efficiency and reduced emissions. In addition to its
hydrogen initiatives, Caterpillar offers the following:
- Caterpillar recently purchased
Tangent Energy Solutions,
an energy-as-a-service (EaaS) company that provides Distributed
Energy Resource Management System (DERMS) software solutions for
monitoring, managing and monetizing on-site energy assets, including
natural-gas and renewable power generation, storage and microgrids.
It also enables utilities and other energy providers to access
distributed energy resources (DERs) that can rapidly increase the
utilization of renewable sources of energy on the grid.
- Caterpillar’s hybrid energy solutions
technology suite includes photovoltaic (PV) solar modules,
bi-directional power (BDP) inverters, energy storage system (ESS)
modules, advanced microgrid controllers and full digital monitoring.
- Cat cogeneration CHP systems and
combined cooling, heat and power (CCHP) systems simultaneously
provide power for electrical loads as well as high-efficiency
heating and cooling.
- Cat generator sets can be configured
to operate on numerous biogas fuels, including fermentation biogas,
landfill gas and wastewater biogas.
- Cat diesel-fueled power solutions have
enabled operation on various hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO),
biodiesel, and blended fuel products for more than a decade,
including designed-to-order systems that can use 100% HVO or
biodiesel.
Caterpillar delivers innovative power
systems engineered for sustainability, durability, reliability and
value. The company offers worldwide product support, parts and
services, and customer value agreements through the Cat authorized
service and dealer network. In addition, dealer technicians are
trained to provide a comprehensive range of maintenance and services
that help customers optimize the total cost of ownership of Cat
equipment.
Downtown St. Paul, Min
Hydrogen-fueled Cat® power
solutions
Green Play Ammonia™, Yielder® NFuel Energy.
Spokane, Washington. 99212
www.exactrix.com
509 995 1879 cell, Pacific.
exactrix@exactrix.com
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