How to build a closed-loop zero-carbon park?

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On March 26, at the Green Hydrogen Coupled with Chemical Industry Innovation Forum held in Beijing, Liu Siming, Director of the Chemical Industrial Park Division at the Petroleum and Chemical Industry Planning Institute, pointed out that creating a closed-loop zero-carbon industrial park requires the systematic integration of five key elements: new energy, energy storage systems, virtual power plants, intelligent energy and carbon management platforms, and green transportation. “Zero-carbon industrial parks should rely on photovoltaic and wind power as their core, making use of the rooftops and unused areas surrounding as well as within the chemical industrial parks to produce and consume green electricity locally, thereby reducing the parks’ dependence on traditional fossil fuels at the source of energy supply. ”Liu Siming said that during the 15th Five-Year Plan period, zero-carbon industrial parks will serve as the key platforms for integrating hydrogen energy development with carbon reduction policies. They can facilitate the implementation of various measures such as energy savings and carbon reduction in chemical industrial parks, the promotion of green fuels, and deep industrial decarbonization, thereby creating a synergistic effect. Among them, hydrogen-based green liquid fuels will provide the key driving force for the development of zero-carbon parks. Their core value lies in creating end-use scenarios for such parks, supplying stable green energy demand, and facilitating the implementation of a circular system for green energy. “The core value of zero-carbon industrial parks lies not only in the use of green electricity, but also in utilizing green electricity, green hydrogen, and new power systems to transform existing chemical production capacity – this represents the key aspect as well as the challenge in achieving deep decarbonization of chemical parks. ”Liu Siming pointed out that in terms of energy storage, zero-carbon parks need to establish an electrochemical energy storage system that can accommodate the intermittent and variable nature of wind and solar power, thereby ensuring a safe and stable energy supply for the parks, while also enhancing the capacity of the power system to regulate peak loads and frequency. In addition, zero-carbon parks should establish virtual power plants to integrate resources such as distributed power sources and energy storage facilities within the park. By leveraging digital technologies, they can improve the efficiency of energy resource utilization and reduce the overall energy costs for the park. In building a smart energy and carbon management platform, zero-carbon parks must integrate functions such as carbon emission accounting and precise energy measurement. By leveraging big data and artificial intelligence technologies, they can achieve real-time monitoring, analytical early warnings, and optimized scheduling of energy and carbon data within the park. This provides a data-driven foundation for emission reduction decisions and facilitates precise carbon control. In the field of green transportation, zero-carbon industrial parks need to promote the use of electric forklifts and new-energy logistics vehicles within the park, establish infrastructure such as charging stations and battery swap stations, optimize transportation routes and loading/unloading processes, significantly reduce emissions from transportation, and build a comprehensive low-carbon logistics system for the park. The development model of “one network, one factory, one platform, and multiple load centers” introduced by Liu Siming represents the specific approach for the coordinated efforts of these five key elements. This model relies on the construction of dedicated incremental distribution networks or smart microgrids within the industrial park, thereby establishing an effective connection between new energy generation sources and the green, high-energy-consuming industries in the park, and reducing the electricity costs for enterprises. Currently, electricity costs account for a significant proportion of the production costs in chemical enterprises. Dedicated distribution networks can greatly reduce the cost of purchasing electricity from the public grid; meanwhile, virtual power plants can facilitate the trading of green electricity, and smart energy and carbon management platforms can enable comprehensive carbon management across the entire supply chain. Projects such as hydrogen-based green liquid fuels serve as core load centers, providing stable channels for the utilization of green electricity and green hydrogen. “There is great potential for the development of zero-carbon industrial parks, but creating zero-carbon sub-parks within chemical industrial parks still faces many challenges. ”Liu Siming called for the development of zero-carbon industrial parks to be carried out in a manner tailored to local conditions and in a cautious manner; only those parks that possess high-quality new energy resources, policy support for grid reforms, and the capacity to accommodate large-scale green projects should proceed with pilot initiatives. It is necessary to resolutely prevent hasty actions that are not based on reality, to ensure the steady progress of building zero-carbon parks.