Publications

Hydrogen as a strategy clean fuel is receiving more and more attention recently in China in addition to the policy emphasis on H2. In this work we conceive of a hydrogen production process based on a chemical regenerative coal gasification. Instead of using a lumped coal gasification as is traditional in the H2 production process herein we used a two-step gasification process that included coking and char-steam gasification. The sensible heat of syngas accounted for 15–20% of the total energy of coal and was recovered and converted into chemical energy of syngas through thermochemical reactions. Moreover the air separation unit was eliminated due to the adoption of steam as oxidant. As a result the efficiency of coal to H2 was enhanced from 58.9% in traditional plant to 71.6% in the novel process. Further the energy consumption decreased from 183.8 MJ/kg in the traditional plant to 151.2 MJ/kg in the novel process. The components of syngas H2 and efficiency of gasification are herein investigated through experiments in fixed bed reactors. Thermodynamic performance is presented for both traditional and novel coal to hydrogen plants.

In recent years growing interest has emerged in investigating the integration of energy storage and green hydrogen production systems with renewable energy generators. These integrated systems address uncertainties related to renewable resource availability and electricity prices mitigating profit loss caused by forecasting errors. This paper focuses on the operation of a hybrid farm (HF) combining an alkaline electrolyzer (AEL) and a battery energy storage system (BESS) with a wind turbine to form a comprehensive HF. The HF operates in both hydrogen and day-ahead electricity markets. A linear mathematical model is proposed to optimize energy management considering electrolyzer operation at partial loads and accounting for degradation costs while maintaining a straightforward formulation for power system optimization. Day-ahead market scheduling and real-time operation are formulated as a progressive mixed-integer linear program (MILP) extended to address uncertainties in wind speed and electricity prices through a two-stage stochastic optimization model. A bootstrap sampling strategy is introduced to enhance the stochastic model’s performance using the same sampled data. Results demonstrate how the strategies outperform traditional Monte Carlo and deterministic approaches in handling uncertainties increasing profits up to 4% per year. Additionally a simulation framework has been developed for validating this approach and conducting different case studies.

ITM Power is a leading electrolyser manufacturer and is a globally recognised expert in hydrogen technologies. In this episode Graham Cooley Chief Executive Officer at ITM Power and John Williams Head of Hydrogen Expertise Cluster at AFRY Management Consulting join us to discuss ITM’s recent announcements. This includes raising £250 million to scale up its electrolyser manufacturing capacity to 5GW per annum by 2024 and forming a partnership with Linde to halve electrolyser manufacturing costs within five years. The episode also explores the UK hydrogen strategy how blue hydrogen compares with green hydrogen the role of electrolysers in hydrogen production and providing flexibility to power grids.

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This report presents an analysis of how hydrogen and battery technologies are likely to be utilised in different sectors within the UK including transportation manufacturing the built environment and power. In particular the report compares the use of hydrogen and battery technology across these sectors. In addition it evaluates where these technologies will be in competition where one technology will dominate and where a combination of the two may be used. This sector analysis draws on DNV’s knowledge and experience within both the battery and hydrogen industries along with a review of studies available in the public domain. The analysis has been incorporated into DNV’s Energy Transition Outlook model an integrated system-dynamics simulation model covering the energy system which provides an independent view of the energy outlook from now until 2050. The modelling which includes data on costs demand supply policy population and economic indicators enables the non-linear interdependencies between different parameters to be considered so that decisions made in one sector influence the decision made in another.

The depletion of fossil fuel sources has encouraged the authorities to use renewable resources such as wind energy to generate electricity. A backup/storage system can improve the performance of wind turbines due to fluctuations in power demand. The novelty of this study is to utilize a hybrid system for a wind farm using the excess electricity generated by the wind turbines to produce hydrogen in an alkaline electrolyzer (AEL). The hydrogen storage tank stores the produced hydrogen and provides hydrogen to the proton-exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) to generate electricity once the power demand is higher than the electricity generated by the wind turbines. The goal of this study is to use the wind profile of a region in Iran namely the Cohen region to analyze the performance of the suggested integrated system on a micro scale. The output results of this study can be used as a case study for construction in the future based on the exact specification of NTK300 wind turbines. The results indicate that with the minimum power supply of 30 kW from the wind turbines on a lab scale the generated power by the PEMFC will be 1008 W while the maximum generated hydrogen will be 304 mL/h.

Rising climate change ambitions require large-scale clean hydrogen production in the near term. “Blue” hydrogen from conventional steam methane reforming (SMR) with pre-combustion CO2 capture can fulfil this role. This study therefore presents techno-economic assessments of a range of SMR process configurations to minimize hydrogen production costs. Results showed that pre-combustion capture can avoid up to 80% of CO2 emissions cheaply at 35 €/ton but the final 20% of CO2 capture is much more expensive at a marginal CO2 avoidance cost around 150 €/ton. Thus post-combustion CO2 capture should be a better solution for avoiding the final 20% of CO2. Furthermore an advanced heat integration scheme that recovers most of the steam condensation enthalpy before the CO2 capture unit can reduce hydrogen production costs by about 6%. Two hybrid hydrogen production options were also assessed. First a “blue-green” hydrogen plant that uses clean electricity to heat the reformer achieved similar hydrogen production costs to the pure blue configuration. Second a “blue turquoise” configuration that replaces the pre-reformer with molten salt pyrolysis for converting higher hydrocarbons to a pure carbon product can significantly reduce costs if carbon has a similar value to hydrogen. In conclusion conventional pre-combustion CO2 capture from SMR is confirmed as a good solution for kickstarting the hydrogen economy and it can be tailored to various market conditions with respect to CO2 electricity and pure carbon prices.

Electrofuels including hydrogen methane and ammonia have been suggested as one pathway in achieving net-zero greenhouse gas energy systems. They can play a role in providing an energy storage and fuel or feedstock to hard-to-abate sectors. In future energy systems their role is often studied in case studies adhering to specific region. In this study we study their role by defining multiple archetypal energy systems which represent approximations of real systems in different regions. Comparing the role of electrofuels across the cost-optimized systems relying only on renewable energy in power generation we found that hydrogen was a significant energy vector in all systems with its annual quantity approaching the classic electricity demand. The role of renewable methane was very limited. Electrofuel storages were needed in all systems and their capacity was the highest in the northern Hemiboreal system. Absence of cavern storage potential did not hamper the significance of electrofuels but increased the role of ammonia and led to average 5.5 % systemic cost increase. Systems where reservoir hydropower was scarce or level of electricity consumption was high needed more fuel storages. The findings of this study can help for better understanding of what kind of storage and generation technologies will be most useful in future carbon-neutral systems in different types of regions.

This paper presents an experimental prototype of hydrogen fuel cells suitable for training engineering students. The presented system is designed to teach students the V-I characteristics of the fuel cells and how to record the V-I characteristics curve in the case of a single or multiple fuel cells. The prototype contains a compact electrolyzer to produce hydrogen and oxygen to the fuel cell. The fuel cell generates electricity to supply power to various types of loads. The paper also illustrates how to calculate the efficiency of fuel cells in series and parallel modes of operation. In the series mode of operation it is mathematically proven that the efficiency is higher at lower currents. Still the fuel cell operating area is required where the power is the highest. According to experimental results the efficiency in the case of series connection is approximately 25% while in parallel operation mode the efficiency is about 50%. Thus a parallel connection is recommended in the high current applications because the efficiency is higher than the one resulted from series connection. As explained later in the study plan several other experiments can be performed using this educational kit.

Hydrogen can play a key role in the gradual transition towards a full decarbonization of the combustion sector e.g. in power generation. Despite the advantages related to the use of this carbon-free fuel there are still several challenging technical issues that must be addressed such as the thermoacoustic instability triggered by hydrogen. Given that burners are usually designed to work with methane or other fossil fuels it is important to investigate their thermoacoustic behavior when fueled by hydrogen. In this framework the present work aims to propose a methodology which combines Computational Fluid Dynamics CFD (3D Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS)) and Finite Element Method (FEM) approaches in order to investigate the fluid dynamic and the thermoacoustic behavior introduced by hydrogen in a burner (a lab-scale bluff body stabilized burner) designed to work with methane. The case of CH4 -air mixture was used for the validation against experimental results and benchmark CFD data available in the literature. Numerical results obtained from CFD simulations namely thermofluidodynamic properties and flame characteristics (i.e. time delay and heat release rate) are used to evaluate the effects of the fuel change on the Flame Response Function to the acoustic perturbation by means of a FEM approach. As results in the H2 -air mixture case the time delay decreases and heat release rate increases with respect to the CH4 -air mixture. A study on the Rayleigh index was carried out in order to analyze the influence of H2 -air mixture on thermoacoustic instability of the burner. Finally an analysis of both frequency and growth rate (GR) on the first four modes was carried out by comparing the two mixtures. In the H2 -air case the modes are prone to become more unstable with respect to the same modes of the case fueled by CH4 -air due to the change in flame topology and variation of the heat release rate and time delay fields.

The information in this report covers the period January 2021 – December 2021. The technology and market module of the FCHO presents a range of statistical data as an indicator of the health of the sector and the progress in market development over time. This includes statistical information on the size of the global fuel cell market including number and capacity of fuel cell systems shipped in a calendar year. For this edition data to the end of 2021 is presented where possible alongside analysis of key sector developments. Fuel cell system shipments for each calendar year are presented both as numbers of units and total system megawatts. The data are further divided and subdivided by:  Application: Total system shipments are divided into Transport Stationary and Portable applications  Fuel cell type: Numbers are provided for each of the different fuel cell chemistry types  Region of integration: Region where the final manufacturer – usually the system integrator – integrates the fuel cell into the final product  Region of deployment: Region where the final product was shipped to for deployment The data is sourced directly from industry players as well as other relevant sources including press releases associations and other industry bodies. This year the report also includes data relating to electrolysers commissioned within Europe. Information is presented on the number of hydrogen refuelling stations (HRS) deployed since 2014 with detailed information on HRS in operation including pressure capacity etc. In parallel the observatory provides data on the registered fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) on European roads providing an indication of the speed of adoption of hydrogen in the transport sector. This annual report is an enrichment analysis of the data available on the FCHO providing global context and insights on trends observed year-over-year. Electrolyser systems commissioned for each calendar year within Europe are presented as both the number of units and the total system power rating in megawatts (MW). The data is further divided by:  Number of Electrolyser Units Commissioned: The number of units brought online each year in Europe from 2000 until 2021.  Application: Total systems commissioned are divided in Transport Fuel Industry Feedstock Steel Making Industrial Heat Power Generation Export Grid Injection and Sector Coupling.  Electrolyser Type: Number for each of the different electrolyser types commissioned are provided.  Region of deployment: Region where the electrolyser was commissioned. All sections in the Technology & Market module are updated following an annual data collection and validation cycle and the annual report is published the following Spring.