A Sustainable Approach for Green Hydrogen Production Using Biomass – only members meeting

05 June 2024, online

05:00 pm IST
01:30 pm CEST

An Atmanirbhar and sustainable approach for Green hydrogen production using biomass

The talk focuses on a technology that has been developed indigenously to convert a range of biomass to hydrogen and other chemicals.  Research at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, on the thermo-chemical conversion of biomass provides an opportunity to synthesize energetic chemicals of desired Carbon to Hydrogen ratio and functional structure using CO and H2 as the principal building blocks.

A novel fixed bed reactor can accept a range of biomass with oxy-steam as reactants and efficiently convert the biomass to bio-syngas, a Hydrogen-rich mixture containing H2/CO/CH4/CO2/N2 components along with other trace compounds. Gaseous mixture with Hydrogen volume fraction between 20% to 50% and H2/CO ratio from 1.0 to over 4.0 can be realized under appropriate conditions using Air/Oxygen/Steam as the gasifying media. Further, using downstream separation techniques results in yields of ~ 100 g of H2/kg of biomass and ~ 500 g of H2-CO mixture (2:1 ratio – Methanol synthesis) at over 75% efficiency. The multi-fuel-based technology is feed agnostic and can handle a range of agro-residues, ideal for distributed hydrogen generation.

The technology using biomass has been developed, it needs necessary policy framework towards showcasing the Atmanirbhar concept and provide leadership to the globe on green hydrogen.

S Dasappa

Professor, Interdisciplinary Centre for Energy Research
Associate faculty: Centre for Sustainable Technologies
Indian Institute of Science

Prof. S Dasappa is currently the Chair of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Energy Research and an associate faculty at the Centre for Sustainable Technologies Indian Institute of Science.

His major area of research is in the combustion of solid, liquid, and gaseous fuels. With an emphasis on energy conversion processes, the R&D activities address both scientific and technological challenges. The research outputs have contributed to the engineering domain by addressing – “Process to Product philosophy” including sustainability through translational research. As a Principal Investigator, Dasappa has secured over 7 million USD projects, with nearly equal amounts from industry and government agencies in the last seven years.   With over 200 publications in various international and national journals, conferences, and edited books, and 25 patents, he has been involved in technology transfers across the globe. Prof Dasappa has been involved in several national and international projects and green hydrogen in recent times. In the recent pandemic situation, Prof. Dasappa was instrumental in developing and deploying medical oxygen generator systems in hospitals.

He has won several awards in Biomass energy – national and international and Professor Dasappa has been identified in the top 2 % of Energy scientists worldwide for 2019, 2021, and 2022 based on Stanford University and published in the journal PLOS Biology and Elsevier Updated science-wide author databases of standardised citation indicators.