Lancaster, California will be home to a "greener than green" trash-to hydrogen production plant three times the size of any other green H2 facility. SGH2 says its process is the cleanest of all on the market, while matching the price of the cheapest producers – and pulling tens of thousands of tons of garbage out of landfills.

For better or worse, many world economies are gearing up to make hydrogen a significant part of the future energy economy. Japan and Korea in particular are making big moves and enormous investments to get this zero-local-emissions energy storage format up and running.

Production of hydrogen can vary from the relatively green (electrolysis of fresh water using solar or wind-based energy) to the profoundly filthy (gasification of brown coal) – and the filthiest are by far the cheapest. Adding carbon capture and sequestration to dirty processes simply makes them more expensive.

That's what makes this SGH2 project so interesting – the company claims it can take trash that would otherwise sit in a landfill and rot, and turn it into super-green hydrogen at bargain-basement prices.

According to a recent memorandum of understanding, the city of Lancaster will host and co-own the SGH2 Lancaster plant, which will be capable of producing up to 11,000 kg of H2 per day, or 3.8 million kg per year, while processing up to 42,000 tons of recycled waste per year. Garbage to clean fuel, with a US$2.1 to $3.2 million saving on landfill costs per year as a sweetener.

"We are the only company in the world delivering green hydrogen that is cost competitive with the cheapest, dirtiest hydrogen made from coal and gas, and much less expensive than other green hydrogen" says SGH2 CEO Dr. Robert Do. "Our technology can scale quickly and produce fuel 24/7, year-round."

How it works

The process, developed by SGH2's parent company Solena, uses high-temperature plasma torches putting out temperatures between 3,500 and 4,000 °C (6,332 to 7,232 °F). This ionic heat, with oxygen-enriched gas fed in, catalyzes a "complete molecular dissociation of all hydrocarbons" in whatever fuel you've fed in, and as it rises and begins to cool, it forms "a very high quality, hydrogen-rich bio-syngas free of tar, soot and heavy metals."

The process accepts a wide variety of waste sources, including paper, old tires, textiles, and notably plastics, which it can handle very efficiently without toxic by-products. The bio-syngas exits the top of a plenum chamber, and is sent to a cooling chamber, followed by a pair of acid scrubbers to remove particulate matter.

A centrifugal compressor further cleans the gas stream, leaving a mixture of hydrogen, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. This is run through a water-gas shift reactor that adds water vapor and converts the carbon monoxide to carbon dioxide and more hydrogen gas. The two are separated, neatly capturing all the CO2 as hydrogen comes out the other end.