Canadian clean-tech company Aurora Hydrogen has talked about the progress it is making bringing its hydrogen-from-methane technology to market.
Aurora, which has its base in Edmonton in Alberta, has a technology to collect the hydrogen contained in natural gas through a process called methane pyrolysis. Crucially, it is a process that doesn’t emit CO2. The natural gas is heated with microwave energy to produce hydrogen and solid carbon – and it is very efficient in comparison with many other forms of hydrogen production.
“What’s beautiful … is the quick progress [we’ve] made so far – it is very exciting,” said Aurora CEO Andrew Gillis in interview with gasworld.
“Once we had filed the patent application, we got into the early lab work and the outcomes were frankly amazing,” he said. “Technology development takes time, as a rule, but within only two months we had taken great strides. That is incredibly fast.”
This early success in the lab prompted investment from oil majors and the VC firm Energy Innovation Capital, which led a $10m Series A funding round for Aurora two years ago, in August 2022, and things have developed quickly since.
“It enabled the next phase. Right now we are building a demonstration plant for field trials here on the outskirts of Edmonton,” said Gillis. “It will produce 150kg to 200kg a day of hydrogen, and it should be ready soon. We are in the middle of fabrication and construction – and it should be commissioned and ready by the end of the year.”
The technology Aurora has created promises to scale very well, and is compact, meaning it has good potential to be dropped into existing industrial facilities, said Gillis.
“Once the demonstration plant has delivered proof of concept, the next increment will likely be a two- or three-metric-tons-per-day plant, which is a size that we know will be a very interesting commercial offering for many companies.”
Using microwaves for direct carbon heating is a highly energy-efficient way to break down methane molecules. That’s because it requires much less energy than electroysis to break down a water molecule. The technology also produces hydrogen at the point of use, removing the question of transportation, which hydrogen from steam methane reforming generally requires.
The idea is that by the end of 2025 this size of plant could start to be developed, with the potential for delivery in 2026.
“And the market [for hydrogen] will continue to develop rapidly in the next year or two, of course,” said Gillis. “Applications in mobility fuelling in particular should start to come through – in rail, in mining, in heavy haulage.”
What might slow down Aurora’s projected roll-out from here?
“There aren’t too many bumps in the road that we can see,” said Gillis. “We are not trying to deliver things at gigantic scale; it is not a centralized technology; it is relatively simple and builds on existing engineering protocols for the most part.”
What will get Aurora there more quickly is partnerships, said Gillis. “We need partnerships with truck operators, for example. We need that vertical stack that our technology and the hydrogen we make can then supply.”
Hydrogen is an energy carrier and Gillis said it was the price of production that would ultimately win out as hydrogen gets fully established.
“Hydrogen is a commodity gas and energy is a commodity. For hydrogen to displace established energies it will come down to cost ultimately. And what’s so promising is that, absent any incentives, our hydrogen can be cost-competitive with diesel. Once you layer low carbon fuel incentives on top of that, things immediately start to look extremely compelling. We are excited to have started on the journey.”
Read the full interview in the September issue of gasworld US magazine, which is out now.
