United Kingdom

The large eddy simulation (LES) model developed at the University of Ulster has been applied to simulate releases of 5.11 m3 liquefied hydrogen (LH2) in open atmosphere and gaseous hydrogen (GH2) in 20-m3 closed vessel. The simulations of a spill of liquefied hydrogen confirmed the advantage of LES application to reproduce experimentally observed eddy structure of hydrogen-air cloud. The inclination angle of simulated cloud is close to experimentally reported 300. The processes of two phase hydrogen release and heat transfer were simplified by inflow of gaseous hydrogen with temperature 20 K equal to boiling point. It is shown that difference in inflow conditions geometry and grid resolution affects simulation results. It is suggested that phenomenon of air condensationevaporation in the cloud in temperature range 20-90 K should be accounted for in future. The simulations reproduced well experimental data on GH2 release and transport in 20-m3 vessel during 250 min including a phenomenon of hydrogen concentration growth at the bottom of the vessel. Higher experimental hydrogen concentration at the bottom is assumed to be due to non-uniformity of temperature of vessel walls generating additional convection. The comparison of convective and diffusion terms in Navie-Stokes equations has revealed that a value of convective term is more than order of magnitude prevail over a value of turbulent diffusion term. It is assumed that the hydrogen transport to the bottom of the vessel is driven by the remaining chaotic flow velocities superimposed on stratified hydrogen concentration field. Further experiments and simulations with higher accuracy have to be performed to confirm this phenomenon. It has been demonstrated that hydrogen-air mixture became stratified in about 1 min after release was completed. However one-dimensional models are seen not capable to reproduce slow transport of hydrogen during long period of time characteristic for scenarios such as leakage in a garage.

HyDeploy is a pioneering hydrogen energy project designed to help reduce UK CO2 emissions and reach the Government’s net zero target for 2050.

As the first ever live demonstration of hydrogen in homes HyDeploy aims to prove that blending up to 20% volume of hydrogen with natural gas is a safe and greener alternative to the gas we use now.  It is  providing evidence on how customers don’t have to change their cooking or heating appliances to take the blend which means less disruption and cost for them.

Hydrogen induced cracking behaviour of O&G nickel alloy 625+ (UNS N07716) was investigated. Deuterium was introduced electrochemically into samples by cathodic polarisation (3.5 wt.% NaCl.D₂O) under different mechanical conditions. Subsequently deuterium distributions were mapped using NanoSIMS. Deuterium was used as an isotopic tracer instead of hydrogen to avoid the detection of hydrogen artefacts. Complimentary image analysis using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and low voltage energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) allowed the identification of microstructural features corresponding to deuterium enrichments. The results provided experimental evidence of enrichments at dislocation slip bands (DSB) twin boundary and grain boundary features that include σ precipitates.

Decarbonisation should be very much on the radar of new LNG projects currently taking FID commissioning around 2024-25 and planning to operate up to 2050. The LNG community needs to replace an `advocacy’ message – based on the generality of emissions from combustion of natural gas being lower than from other fossil fuels – with certified data on carbon and methane emissions from specific elements of the value chain for individual projects. As carbon reduction targets tighten over the coming decade LNG cargoes which do not have value chain emissions certified by accredited authorities or which fail to meet defined emission levels run the risk of progressively being deemed to have a lower commercial value and eventually being excluded from jurisdictions with the strictest standards. There will be no place in this process for confidentiality; nothing less than complete transparency of data and methodologies will be acceptable.<br/>In relation to affordability prospects for new projects look much better than they did three years ago. Cost estimates for most new projects suggest that they will be able to deliver profitably to most established and anticipated import markets at or below the wholesale prices prevailing in those markets over the past decade although affordability in south Asian countries may be challenging. But new projects need to factor in costs related to future decarbonisation requirements in both exporting and importing countries. To the extent that LNG suppliers can meet standards through relatively low-cost offsets – forest projects low-cost biogas and biomethane – this may not greatly impact their commercial viability. However any requirement to transform methane into hydrogen with CCS in either the exporting or importing country would substantially impact project economics and the affordability of LNG relative to other energy choices.

Road transport is recognized as having a negative impact on the environment. Policy has focused on replacement of the internal combustion engine (ICE) with less polluting forms of technology including battery electric and fuel cell electric powertrains. However progress is slow and both battery and fuel cell based vehicles face considerable commercialization challenges. To understand these challenges a review of current electric battery and fuel cell electric technologies is presented. Based on this review this paper proposes a battery electric vehicle (BEV) where components are sized to take into account the majority of user requirements with the remainder catered for by a trailer-based demountable intelligent fuel cell range extender. The proposed design can extend the range by more than 50% for small BEVs and 25% for large BEVs (the extended range of vehicles over 250 miles) reducing cost and increasing efficiency for the BEV. It enables BEV manufacturers to design their vehicle battery for the most common journeys decreases charging time to provide convenience and flexibility to the drivers. Adopting a rent and drop business model reduces the demand on the raw materials bridging the gap in the amount of charging (refueling) stations and extending the lifespan for the battery pack.

The European Commission have just stated that hydrogen would play a major role in the economic recovery of post-COVID-19 EU countries. Hydrogen is recognised as one of the key players in a fossil fuel-free world in decades to come. However commercially practiced pathways to hydrogen production todays are associated with a considerable amount of carbon emissions. The Paris Climate Change Agreement has set out plans for an international commitment to reduce carbon emissions within the forthcoming decades. A sustainable hydrogen future would only be achievable if hydrogen production is “designed” to capture such emissions. Today nearly 98% of global hydrogen production relies on the utilisation of fossil fuels. Among these steam methane reforming (SMR) boasts the biggest share of nearly 3 50% of the global generation. SMR processes correspond to a significant amount of carbon emissions at various points throughout the process. Despite the dark side of the SMR processes they are projected to play a major role in hydrogen production by the first half of this century. This that a sustainable yet clean short/medium-term hydrogen production is only possible by devising a plan to efficiently capture this co-produced carbon as stated in the latest International Energy Agency (IEA) reports. Here we have carried out an in-depth technical review of the processes employed in sorption-enhanced steam methane reforming (SE-SMR) an emerging technology in low-carbon SMR for combined carbon capture and hydrogen production. This paper aims to provide an in-depth review on two key challenging elements of SE-SMR i.e. the advancements in catalysts/adsorbents preparation and current approaches in process synthesis and optimisation including the employment of artificial intelligence in SE-SMR processes. To the best of the authors‟ knowledge there is a clear gap in the literature where the above areas have been scrutinised in a systematic and coherent fashion. The gap is even more pronounced in the application of AI in SE-SMR technologies. As a result this work aims to fill this gap within the scientific literature.

Since the UK’s Net Zero greenhouse gas emissions target was set in 2019 organisations across the energy systems community have released pathways on how we might get there – which end-use technologies are deployed across each sector of demand how our fossil fuel-based energy supply would be transferred to low carbon vectors and to what extent society must change the way it demands energy services. This paper presents a comparative analysis between seven published Net Zero pathways for the UK energy system collected from Energy Systems Catapult National Grid ESO Centre for Alternative Technology and the Climate Change Committee. The key findings reported are that (i) pathways that rely on less stringent behavioural changes require more ambitious technology development (and vice versa); (ii) electricity generation will increase by 51-160% to facilitate large-scale fuel-switching in heating and transport the vast majority of which is likely to be generated from variable renewable sources; (iii) hydrogen is an important energy vector in meeting Net Zero for all pathways providing 100-591 TWh annually by 2050 though the growth in demand is heavily dependent on the extent to which it is used in supplying heating and transport demand. This paper also presents a re-visited analysis of the potential renewable electricity generation resource in the UK. It was found that the resource for renewable electricity generation outstrips the UK’s projected 2050 electricity demand by a factor 12-20 depending on the pathway. As made clear in all seven pathways large-scale deployment of flexibility and storage is required to match this abundant resource to our energy demand.

An independent report by the CCUS Cost Challenge Taskforce setting out the industry’s view on how best to progress carbon capture usage and storage (CCUS) in the UK in order to enable the UK to have the option of deploying CCUS at scale during the 2030s subject to costs coming down sufficiently.

Numerical experiments are performed to understand different regimes of hydrogen non-premixed combustion in an enclosure with passive ventilation through one horizontal or vertical vent located at the top of a wall. The Reynolds averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model with a reduced chemical reaction mechanism is described in detail. The model is based on the renormalization group (RNG) k-ε turbulence model the eddy dissipation concept (EDC) model for simulation of combustion coupled with the 18-step reduced chemical mechanism (8 species) and the in-situ adaptive tabulation (ISAT) algorithm that accelerates the reacting flow calculations by two to three orders of magnitude. The analysis of temperature and species (hydroxyl hydrogen oxygen water) concentrations in time as well as the velocity through the vent shed a light on regimes and dynamics of indoor hydrogen fires. A well-ventilated fire is simulated in the enclosure at a lower release flow rate and complete combustion of hydrogen within the enclosure. Fire becomes under-ventilated at higher release flow rates with two different modes observed. The first mode is the external flame stabilised at the enclosure vent at moderate release rates and the second mode is the self-extinction of combustion inside and outside the enclosure at higher hydrogen release rates. The simulations demonstrated a complex reacting flow dynamics in the enclosure that leads to formation of the external flame or the self-extinction. The air intake into the enclosure at later stages of the process through the whole vent area is a characteristic feature of the self-extinction regime. This air intake is due to faster cooling of hot combustion products by sustained colder hydrogen leak compared to the generation of hot products by the ceasing chemical reactions inside the enclosure and hydrogen supply. In general an increase of hydrogen sustained release flow rate will change fire regime from the well-ventilated combustion within the enclosure through the external flame stabilised at the vent and finally to the self-extinction of combustion throughout the domain.

The heat and buildings strategy sets out the government’s plan to significantly cut carbon emissions from the UK’s 30 million homes and workplaces in a simple low-cost and green way whilst ensuring this remains affordable and fair for households across the country. Like the transition to electric vehicles this will be a gradual transition which will start by incentivizing consumers and driving down costs.<br/>There are about 30 million buildings in the UK. Heating these buildings contributes to almost a quarter of all UK emissions. Addressing the carbon emissions produced in heating and powering our homes workplaces and public buildings can not only save money on energy bills and improve lives but can support up to 240000 skilled green jobs by 2035 boosting the economic recovery levelling up across the country and ensuring we build back better.<br/>The heat and buildings strategy builds on the commitments made in Clean growth: transforming heating our Energy white paper and the Prime Minister’s 10 point plan. This strategy aims to provide a clear direction of travel for the 2020s set out the strategic decisions that need to be taken this decade and demonstrate how we plan to meet our carbon targets and remain on track for net zero by 2050.