Commutative semigroups whose homomorphic images in groups are groups

In this paper we study commutative semigroups whose every homomorphic image in a group is a group. We find that for a commutative semigroup S, this property is equivalent to S being a union of subsemigroups each of which either has a kernel or else is isomorphic to one of a sequence T₀, T₁, T₂, ... of explicitly given, countably infinite semigroups without idempotents. Moreover, if S is also finitely generated then this property is equivalent to S having a kernel.