Carbon Capture Utilisation and Storage in Extractive Industries for Methanol Production

The elevated increase of CO2 emissions related to activities of the extractive industry is becoming a challenging issue gradually affecting climate change and global warming. In this frame, the effective utilisation of CO2 through the techniques of Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) as well as Carbon Capture and Utilisation (CCU) can alleviate the greenhouse effect. Converting CO2 into a value-added chemical or liquid fuel (e.g., methanol, hydrocarbons, propylene, dimethyl ether, ethylene, etc.) is a promising approach in this regard. Methanol (MeOH) synthesis offers a key feedstock for industries, being both an industrial commodity for several chemical products and an efficient transportation fuel. This article presents a review of the CCS and CCU technologies for the production of MeOH in extractive industries. The CCS technologies investigated in this framework are the amine-based absorption and the WGS-enhanced CCS. The CCU technologies are CO2 hydrogenation and enhanced CO2 transformation by the Fischer-Tropsch reaction. Incorporating these systems for the processing of the flue-gases of the extractive industries significantly reduces the CO2 emissions, while creating new revenues by the production of valuable MeOH.