Recently, the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) in the latest round of investment activities, selected a solar thermal technology for Australia's largest industrial sector-alumina smelting to provide heat source projects, and hope to take this measure to make the field of fossil fuel dependence by about 50%.

The project, led by the University of Adelaide and jointly with Australian aluminum giant Alcoa, will jointly assess the development potential and feasibility of using photothermal technology to provide thermal energy for the operation of alumina refineries in Australia and other regions.

It is understood that the total investment of the project will be as high as $15 million. The chairman of ARENA IvorFrischknecht used the word "critical" to describe the importance of the project. At present, ARENA has provided financial support for the project with US $4.5 million, which also makes it the largest project in this round of investment activities so far.

"Refining aluminum is undoubtedly the largest industrial sector in Australia, and the process of smelting bauxite into alumina consumes a lot of energy, so the project will explore whether photothermal technology can be used to provide heat for the smelting process instead of using a lot of natural gas, which will be very different from many factories that use coal," Frischknecht said at an investment conference held by ARENA last Wednesday."

It is reported that in addition to the University of Adelaide and Alcoa, the project team also includes CSIRO (Australian Federal Scientific and Industrial Research Organization), ETHZurich (Federal Institute of Technology Zurich), ITPower, University of New South Wales and San Diego State University in the United States. All parties aim to gradually integrate low-temperature concentrated heat utilization technology, solar energy-natural gas composite energy supply technology and high-temperature concentrated heat utilization technology through technical research and process research, in order to replace the current commonly used Bayer process (with caustic solution pressure dissolution of bauxite alumina production method) alumina production process.

According to the team, their ultimate goal is to further reduce carbon dioxide emissions by improving the level of technology, mixing solar energy to achieve continuous production of alumina, and reducing the use of fossil fuels to about 45% of the current use. and hedge against economic losses caused by fluctuations in natural gas prices.

Project leader GusNathan from the University of Adelaide said that this project is very important because it is the first great attempt in the world to apply photothermal technology to the use of industrial thermal energy other than power generation.

Nathan said: "Electricity accounts for less than half of the total energy demand of society, and the industrial heat utilization field requires more energy, but there is no commercial concentrated heat utilization project at present."

On the possibility that fossil fuels will be replaced, Nathan added: "The heating sector is obviously much larger than the power generation sector, so the importance goes without saying. Our goal is to use renewable energy to provide 50% of the energy needed for industrial heat utilization."

According to Nathan, although the proposed commercialization project has not officially started, the project research and development team has met with Alcoa and made an offer. The team hopes to submit a financing application for the construction of the demonstration project within two years in the near future.

Nathan said: "If the plan to cooperate with Alcoa goes well, it will have a huge impact on the industry, because the technology can also be applied to similar magnesia, zirconia and lime production processes. The application of photothermal in chemical processes is extremely wide, such as the production of heat-resistant steel, iron, glass, fuel and other industrial processes, the market potential is unlimited."