Low-Temperature, Efficient Heat Capture to Reduce Natural Gas Consumption in the Industrial Sector

California’s industrial sector is the largest consumer of natural gas, accounting for 33 percent of total annual natural gas consumption. Increasing energy efficiency through the recovery and reuse of waste heat to reduce both energy consumed and associated greenhouse gas emissions could significantly enhance the global market competitiveness of the industrial sector. 

In this project, Element 16 Technologies, Inc. successfully developed and demonstrated a low-temperature waste heat recovery system at the Searles Valley Minerals industrial facility in Trona, California. The waste heat recovery system developed by Element 16 Technologies effectively captured and repurposed vented low-pressure steam to dry V-BOR (a form of borax pentahydrate), thereby reducing the rotary dryer’s natural gas consumption. Additionally, the project addressed Searles Valley Minerals' critical water-resource challenges by incorporating a water storage tank, which conserved water by recycling the cold condensate back into the facility. Implementation of this waste heat recovery system led to a measured reduction of approximately 15 percent in specific natural gas consumption for drying V-BOR. This reduction translates to energy savings of 36,700 British thermal units per ton of V-BOR product, amounting to annual savings of 5,333 metric million British thermal units. 

This project’s success paved the way for a follow-up grant project funded by the California Energy Commission to test and demonstrate Element 16’s flagship sulfur-thermal energy storage product at its facility. This report discusses both the successful pilot demonstration of the waste heat recovery system at Searles Valley Minerals and the technology-to-market activities of the sulfur thermal energy storage technology that have provided more than $8 million in research, development, and commercialization funding since the award of this project.