ExpectedOutcome:
The topic aims to develop and demonstrate the technological foundations of large LH2 refuelling stations for the heavy-duty transport sectors such as aviation, maritime and railroad sectors, and thereby address and overcome the challenges that are remaining in their development. The main challenges are the development and demonstration of key equipment at the required scales such as high flowrate liquid hydrogen pumps, the management of higher volume boil-off gas, the lack of safety protocols and overall station integration. Ultimately, this topic aims to facilitate widespread LH2 delivery across each of the identified transportation sectors.
Hydrogen is liquefied by reducing its temperature to -253°C, increasing its volumetric energy density. This enables hydrogen storage in large quantities and its transportation by road or ship from centralised or decentralised production unit to customers, as well as the LH2 on-board storage for direct use in heavy-duty vehicles such as trucks, ships, trains or aircraft.
The HRS is a key stage in the hydrogen value chain as it performs the final delivery of hydrogen in gaseous or liquid form to the vehicle tank. Current projects are already developing hydrogen refuelling stations to store and distribute liquid hydrogen to heavy-duty trucks. However, the challenges of larger LH2 HRS for ships, trains, and aircraft, in terms of flowrate capacities, performance, protocols and working environments (harbour, airport, train depots) are still to be addressed. As maritime, aviation and railroad sectors share similar technological concepts and equipment, this topic aims to demonstrate first their feasibility.
The project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:
- Accelerating the implementation of liquid hydrogen for heavy-duty mobility, especially ships, trains and airplanes;
- Development of common technical concepts and equipment for large refuelling stations, preparing their dissemination to EU rail, maritime and aviation sectors;
- Evaluation and demonstration of operational, inspection and maintenance requirements of large-scale refuelling station;
- Achievement of a cost reduction, energy efficient and low emitting hydrogen value chain.
- Development of guidelines for harmonised interfaces systems and standardisation protocols between refuelling station and tank vessel inside EU to be provided for pre-normative actions and further world-wide adoption.
Project results are expected to contribute to the following objectives and KPIs of the Clean Hydrogen JU SRIA:
- Station delivery flowrate of liquid hydrogen dispensed corresponding to nominal flowrate of pumping and dispensing system (in tonnes per hour - TPH): > 5;
- Station energy consumption per kg of hydrogen dispensed when the station is loaded at 80% of its daily capacity (in kWh/kg): < 0.3;
- Liquid hydrogen refuelling station contribution in hydrogen price (in €/kg): 2;
Scope:
The configuration of a hydrogen refuelling station is primarily defined by the state of hydrogen supplied to the station, either gaseous or liquid, and as supplied to the receiving tank, also gaseous or liquid. Liquid hydrogen refuelling stations are to be understood as refuelling stations storing LH2 while primarily delivering LH2, for instance to increase HRS efficiency. Liquid hydrogen refuelling stations are essentially composed of the following sub-systems:
- liquid hydrogen fixed or mobile storage;
- liquid hydrogen pump at low pressure (< 30 bar);
- liquid hydrogen dispenser to vessel / vehicle receptacle (break away, nozzle, flexible, flow meter, coupling);
- boil-off gas management system.
There are currently a number of challenges associated with the scale-up of large liquid hydrogen refuelling stations for the delivery of low-cost liquid hydrogen:
- Current liquid hydrogen low pressure pumping systems have not been demonstrated to reach high delivery flowrates (>5 TPH) at a high TRL (currently at TRL 3) while various challenges are yet to be overcome, including mechanical construction to minimise thermal losses, the filtration and purging processes to deal with condensed particles, and high rotation speeds over extended periods;
- In a liquid hydrogen station, boil-off gas on is mainly expected to be generated during liquid hydrogen loading. This requires the management of significant quantities of low pressure, cold but valuable gaseous hydrogen. Given the very high refuelling flow rates, active recondensation systems are not currently considered feasible due to the high-power requirement, so alternative solutions will have to be developed;
- The integration and assembly of large-scale liquid hydrogen refuelling stations has not previously been demonstrated, given that liquid hydrogen handling difficulty increases with higher flowrates;
- There are no uniform standards and safety regulations for liquid hydrogen refuelling stations while communication and emergency mitigation protocols are still to be developed.
The scope of this topic is to develop, build and operate a liquid hydrogen refuelling station that should demonstrate a delivery flowrate of at least 5 tonnes per hour. The LH2 HRS should demonstrate a potential for scaling-up with technical and economic improvements. The LH2 HRS should be capable of reducing the energy consumption and specific cost of hydrogen to prepare for the wide scale deployment of hydrogen for the benefit of heavy-duty transport and its ecosystem with zero emissions. The demonstration of a high-performance large hydrogen refuelling station would impact other SRIA roadmaps related to liquid hydrogen (transportation, storage, end-usage as aviation, etc).
The following activities should be within the scope of this topic:
- Development of a demonstrator with proven scalability in railroad, aircraft or maritime applications;
- Provision of a techno-economic analysis of the performance of these systems including energy consumption (in kWh/kgH2), CAPEX, OPEX;
- Development of a model to forecast boil-off gas generation during operations;
- Development of a metrology system or methodology for measuring or evaluating the quality and quantity of delivered hydrogen (ortho-para content, temperature, pressure). Proposals are expected to collaborate and explore synergies with the activities of EURAMET’s European Metrology Networks[1] (e.g MetHyInfra[2] project).
- Development of a methodology to evaluate hydrogen emissions (including leakage);
- Development of operations protocols, including for fuelling, venting or flaring, stand-by and emergency;
- Evaluate the life cycle environmental performance of the system.
Optionally, the demonstration may include the dual usage or the repurposing of LNG import terminals.
Proposals are expected to explore synergies with the topic included in Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023-2024 HORIZON-CL5-2023-D5-01-07: ‘Hydrogen-powered aviation’ and with the activities of ZEWT partnership.
Applicants are encouraged to address sustainability and circularity aspects in the activities proposed.
This topic is expected to contribute to EU competitiveness and industrial leadership by supporting a European value chain for hydrogen and fuel cell systems and components.
Proposals should provide a preliminary draft on ‘hydrogen safety planning and management’ at the project level, which will be further updated during project implementation.
Activities are expected to start at TRL 4 and achieve TRL 6-7 by the end of the project - see General Annex B.
The maximum Clean Hydrogen JU contribution that may be requested is EUR 5.00 million – proposals requesting Clean Hydrogen JU contributions above this amount will not be evaluated.
At least one partner in the consortium must be a member of either Hydrogen Europe or Hydrogen Europe Research.
Purchases of equipment, infrastructure or other assets used for the action must be declared as depreciation costs. However, for the following equipment, infrastructure or other assets purchased specifically for the action (or developed as part of the action tasks): HRS and related components, costs may exceptionally be declared as full capitalised costs.
The conditions related to this topic are provided in the chapter 2.2.3.2 of the Clean Hydrogen JU 2023 Annual Work Plan and in the General Annexes to the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023–2024 which apply mutatis mutandis.
Specific Topic Conditions:
Activities are expected to start at TRL 4 and achieve TRL 6-7 by the end of the project - see General Annex B.
[1]https://www.euramet.org/european-metrology-networks
[2]https://www.euramet.org/european-metrology-networks/energy-gases/activities-impact/projects/project-details/project/metrology-infrastructure-for-high-pressure-gas-and-liquified-hydrogen-flows
