Haffner Energy: thermolysis of biomass to produce hydrogen
Haffner Energy is a company marketing a process for producing hydrogen by thermolysis of biomass.
Company history
The project is the result of a long-standing ambition on the part of two brothers, Marc and Philippe Haffner. In 1993, they launched the Soten company, which had already set out to convert biomass into energy.
The road to hydrogen production
Around 2010, the company began investigating new biomass gasification methods, and they realized that this could be an interesting avenue for producing hydrogen. By 2015, they had already filed 10 patents on this technology, dubbed HYNOCA. They then created Haffner Energy as the parent company of Soten, the latter being dedicated to the development of Hynoca (haffner-energy website)
Haffner Energy: IPO on euronext growth Paris
The company successfully completed its initial public offering on the Euronext Growth market at the beginning of February 2022, increasing its capital by 66.7 million euros. Shares were offered in a range from €8.00 to €9.50 per share.
Haffner Energy’s major innovation: HYNOCA modules
Haffner Energy’s main asset at present is the Hynoca process. The heart of the process is made up of two central parts: thermolysis (rq: oxygen-free pyrolysis / pyrogasification, if I’ve understood correctly) in the absence of oxygen and air at 500°C, which co-produces biochar, and then reforming / steam cracking of the gas produced. It seems that this process also releases a syngas they call “hypergas”, which is said to have a particularly high energy content (Lower Calorific Value > 9MJ/m3). Then there are the classic processes (catalytic reduction or Water Gas Shift, followed by purification).
Hynoca would be sold in modules reflecting this succession of stages: a first thermolysis stage, a connection area, then a steam cracking unit. Above, the purification unit extracts the pure hydrogen. A 40-foot (= 16-meter) module would produce 15 to 30kg/h of dihydrogen.
Its hydrogen production costs would be competitive, ” very competitive hydrogen production costs, between €1.5 and €3/kg”
(at 30 bar pressure, operating 8,200 hours a year)”. One kg of hydrogen produced by this process would capture, through biochar production, the equivalent of 16kg of CO2, giving the process a negative carbon footprint: – 12kg net! (haffnerenergy-finance website)
[Reservation: I’ve yet to delve into the difference between thermolysis and pyrogasification, as the two processes seem very similar]