ARPA-E’s REFUEL (Renewable Energy to Fuels through Utilization of Energy-dense Liquids) program is investing in the development of scalable technologies for conversion of electrical or thermal energy from renewable sources into chemical energy contained in energy dense Carbon-Neutral Liquid Fuels (CNLFs), such as ammonia, that can be stored, transported, and later converted into hydrogen or electricity to provide power for transportation, distributed energy generation or other uses.
Projects funded under the ARPA-E REFUEL program, and related awards from other ARPA-E programs, have developed technologies that facilitate the synthesis and use of ammonia at a scale of up to 10 kg per day. In order to mitigate the substantial energy usage and environmental footprint associated with the current standard Haber-Bosch process to synthesize ammonia, ARPA-E is funding a pre-production, integrated system involving a skid-mounted ammonia synthesis system connected to an intermittent renewable energy source at a production scale of 1 metric ton of ammonia per day. Specifically, ARPA-E aims to support the integration and scaling of multiple ammonia synthesis steps being advanced by several technology developers under a single project led by a single awardee ("integrator").