Implementing a Hydrogen Energy Infrastructure: Storage Options and System Design
- PDF / 391,656 Bytes
- 12 Pages / 612 x 792 pts (letter) Page_size
- 64 Downloads / 195 Views
0895-G02-01.1
Implementing a Hydrogen Energy Infrastructure: Storage Options and System Design Joan M. Ogden a,b and Christopher Yang b a Department of Environmental Science and Policy b Institute of Transportation Studies One Shields Avenue University of California Davis, CA 95616, U.S.A. ABSTRACT The development of a hydrogen infrastructure has been identified as a key barrier to implementing hydrogen as for a future transportation fuel. Several recent studies of hydrogen infrastructure have assessed near-term and long-term alternatives for hydrogen supply. In this paper, we discuss how improvements in current hydrogen storage technologies could change how a future hydrogen infrastructure is designed. Using a simplified engineering/economic model for hydrogen infrastructure design and cost, we explore some potential impacts of nearterm advances in storage performance and cost, in terms of system design, cost, energy use, and greenhouse gas emissions. We find that the characteristics of hydrogen storage play a major role in the design, cost, energy use, and CO2 emissions of hydrogen supply infrastructure. INTRODUCTION Hydrogen is receiving increased attention as a future transportation fuel. Fuel cell vehicles fueled by hydrogen offer the potential for a significant increase in vehicle efficiency, reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases and air pollutants to near zero and the possibility of using diverse primary energy sources for fuel production. Fuel cell vehicles might also enable new energy services, such as mobile electricity and the ability to plug in the electrical grid, and innovative automotive designs built around electric drive trains [3]. There are also many challenges to overcome before hydrogen can be widely used for energy applications. Hydrogen production, storage and distribution are mature technologies that efficiently delivery large quantities of hydrogen to chemical users. However, many existing hydrogen technologies need further development, in order to reduce costs and improve performance, before they can be commercialized for consumer energy markets. Fuel cells for light duty vehicles are still an order of magnitude more costly than internal combustion engines, and durability needs to be increased by roughly a factor of three [4]. To fully realize hydrogen’s environmental benefits, low carbon emitting, low polluting, low cost hydrogen production systems are needed. Hydrogen is produced at large scale today for industrial applications such as oil refining and ammonia production (about 2% of world primary energy is used to produce industrial hydrogen). Hydrogen production via reforming or gasification of fossil fuels and water electrolysis are well-established commercial technologies. However, further work is needed on renewable hydrogen production methods such as biomass gasification, wind electrolysis and technologies for carbon capture and sequestration. Hydrogen storage onboard vehicles has been identified as a key challenge. Hydrogen energy storage density has been steadily increasing
Data Loading...
