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Pyroprocessing
Creating value from waste
The CircFuel research project is investigating whether a usable fuel oil can be produced from RDF as a product of the Fuller FUELFLEX® Pyrolyzer.
Net-zero cement production is something we’re committed to achieving, and it's a challenge we're tackling from every angle we can. This update brings together some genuinely exciting news: two major projects wrapped up, one ongoing, and a brand new one with a lot of potential, which pulls all that hard-won knowledge together.
- NEWCEMENT (concluded end of August) – developing oxyfuel combustion simulation tools and a pilot calciner tests to effectively produce a high-purity, easily separated CO2 stream.
- Tomorrow FUELFLEX (concluded) – developed meal-bed CFD simulation models of the FUELFLEX® Pyrolyzer and GREYMAX, to optimise how fuel and raw materials behave inside them.
- ECEM (ongoing) – researching and developing electrification concepts for calciners.
- CAP-FLEX (newly launched) – bringing these results together with co-funding from the INNO-CCUS partnership to adapt the FUELFLEX Pyrolyzer into a technology that can also produce high-purity CO2.
NEWCEMENT
Working alongside Danish Technological Institute, Lhoist, and Technical University of Denmark, this project pushes oxyfuel combustion technology forward as a route to net-zero cement production – and we're really pleased with where it's landed. We've worked to understand and overcome the challenges of operating with down to five times less gas flow in calciners to effectively create a high-purity, easily separated CO2 stream, which is key to CCUS. As NEWCEMENT wraps up at the end of August, everything we've learned – together with the results of Tomorrow FUELFLEX and ECEM – will feed straight into our new CAP-FLEX project. Mohammad Senoukesh will defend his PhD thesis with many key results by the end of this year.
Tomorrow FUELFLEX
This project wrapped up at the end of May, and it produced some critical tools. Working with Indian Institute of Technology Madras and the Technical University of Denmark, we developed CFD simulation models for pulsed fluidized beds with different mixtures of particles (raw meal, clay and fuel) present in the FUELFLEX Pyrolyzer and GREYMAX. These tools are going to be instrumental in shaping CAP-FLEX. (Read more in the Chemical Engineering Science article "An experimental and CFD investigation of pulsed fluidization of cohesive particles": https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S000925092501797X or via the Energy Consortium: https://energyconsortium.org/projects/tomorrow-project-towards-decarbonization-of-cement-industry-model-based-optimization-of-a-pyrolysis-technology-for-flexible-use-of-waste-fuels/)
CAP-FLEX
This is where it all comes together. CAP-FLEX will adapt our own FUELFLEX® Pyrolyzer so it can also produce high-purity CO2, using either oxyfuel combustion or electric heating. We delighted to be working on this with Mannok – a pioneering cement company and the very first home of the FUELFLEX® Pyrolyzer – alongside the Technical University of Denmark and the Danish Technological Institute, with co-funding from the INNO-CCUS partnership. The CAP-FUELFLEX concept is built on our patent-pending "Fluidized bed calciner" concept (WO2025262607A1), and it's an exciting step forward for net-zero cement production. Direct CO2 production by oxyfuel or indirect calcination is widely recognised as the most cost- and energy-efficient way to capture carbon in our industry.
Lars Skaarup Jensen presented the CAP-FLEX project through a poster session at the Danish CCUS Summit. Learn more about the project below. https://inno-ccus.dk/pool-project/cap-flex/ .
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