Publications

In its new report Making the Hydrogen Economy Possible: Accelerating clean hydrogen in an electrified economy the ETC outlines the role of clean hydrogen in achieving a highly electrified net-zero economy. The report sets out how a combination of private-sector collaboration and policy support can drive the initial ramp up of clean hydrogen production and use to reach 50 million tonnes by 2030.<br/>Clean hydrogen will play a complementary role to decarbonise sectors where direct electrification is likely to be technologically very challenging or prohibitively expensive such as in steel production and long-distance shipping. The report highlights how critical rapid ramp-up of production and use in the 2020s is to unlock cost reductions and to make mid-century growth targets achievable.<br/>This report is part of the ETC’s wider Making Mission Possible Series – a series of reports outlining how to scale up clean energy provision within the next 30 years to meet the needs of a net-zero greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) economy by mid-century. The reports in the series analyse and set out specific actions required in the next decade to put this net-zero by 2050 target within reach.

In the search for new efficient photo-catalysts for hydrogen production through water splitting the main attention has been paid to tuning the band gap width and its position with respect to vacuum level. However actual electro-catalytic activity for the water oxidation reaction on a catalyst surface is no less important than those quantities. In this work we evaluate from first principles the thermodynamics of the reaction on relatively new candidates for water splitting: two-dimensional C₂N and that doped with phosphorus. We find that the 4-step reaction usually expected for water splitting will not proceed on these systems resulting in oxygen atoms left strongly adsorbed to the surface. Another option a 3-step reaction is also found to be unfavorable. We also test an effect of higher oxygen coverage on the reaction thermodynamics as suggested elsewhere. We find that indeed the doubled O-coverage makes the 4-step reaction feasible for the doped C₂N. However an unacceptably high anode potential is required to make this reaction proceed. We thus conclude that the materials under consideration may not be efficient electro-catalysts for water splitting.

The grand challenges in renewable energy lie in our ability to comprehend efficient energy conversion systems together with dealing with the problem of intermittency via scalable energy storage systems. Relatively little progress has been made on this at grid scale and two overriding challenges still need to be addressed: (i) limiting damage to the environment and (ii) the question of environmentally friendly energy conversion. The present review focuses on a novel route for producing hydrogen the ultimate clean fuel from the Sun and renewable energy source. Hydrogen can be produced by light-driven photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting but it is very inefficient; rather we focus here on how electric fields can be applied to metal oxide/water systems in tailoring the interplay with their intrinsic electric fields and in how this can alter and boost PEC activity drawing both on experiment and non-equilibrium molecular simulation.

The climate changes that are becoming visible today are a challenge for the global research community. The stationary applications sector is one of the most important energy consumers. Harnessing the potential of renewable energy worldwide is currently being considered to find alternatives for obtaining energy by using technologies that offer maximum efficiency and minimum pollution. In this context new energy generation technologies are needed to both generate low carbon emissions as well as identifying planning and implementing the directions for harnessing the potential of renewable energy sources. Hydrogen fuel cell technology represents one of the alternative solutions for future clean energy systems. This article reviews the specific characteristics of hydrogen energy which recommends it as a clean energy to power stationary applications. The aim of review was to provide an overview of the sustainability elements and the potential of using hydrogen as an alternative energy source for stationary applications and for identifying the possibilities of increasing the share of hydrogen energy in stationary applications respectively. As a study method was applied a SWOT analysis following which a series of strategies that could be adopted in order to increase the degree of use of hydrogen energy as an alternative to the classical energy for stationary applications were recommended. The SWOT analysis conducted in the present study highlights that the implementation of the hydrogen economy depends decisively on the following main factors: legislative framework energy decision makers information and interest from the end beneficiaries potential investors and existence of specialists in this field.

Globally the accelerating use of renewable energy sources enabled by increased efficiencies and reduced costs and driven by the need to mitigate the effects of climate change has significantly increased research in the areas of renewable energy production storage distribution and end-use. Central to this discussion is the use of hydrogen as a clean efficient energy vector for energy storage. This review by experts of Task 32 “Hydrogen-based Energy Storage” of the International Energy Agency Hydrogen TCP reports on the development over the last 6 years of hydrogen storage materials methods and techniques including electrochemical and thermal storage systems. An overview is given on the background to the various methods the current state of development and the future prospects. The following areas are covered; porous materials liquid hydrogen carriers complex hydrides intermetallic hydrides electro-chemical storage of energy thermal energy storage hydrogen energy systems and an outlook is presented for future prospects and research on hydrogen-based energy storage

This study documents the results of economic assessment concerning four variants of coal gasification to hydrogen in a shell reactor. That assessment has been made using discounting methods (NPV: net present value IRR: internal rate of return) as well as indicators based on a free cash flow to firm (FCFF) approach. Additionally sensitivity analysis has been carried out along with scenario analysis in current market conditions concerning prices of hard coal lignite hydrogen and CO2 allowances as well as capital expenditures and costs related to carbon capture and storage (CCS) systems. Based on NPV results a negative economic assessment has been obtained for all the analyzed variants varying within the range of EUR −903 to −142 million although the variants based on hard coal achieved a positive IRR (5.1–5.7%) but lower than the assumed discount rates. In Polish conditions the gasification of lignite seems to be unprofitable in the assumed scale of total investment outlays and the current price of coal feedstock. The sensitivity analyses indicate that at least a 20% increase of hydrogen price would be required or a similar reduction of capital expenditures (CAPEX) and costs of operation for the best variant to make NPV positive. Analyses have also indicated that on the economic basis only the prices of CO2 allowances exceeding EUR 40/Mg (EUR 52/Mg for lignite) would generate savings due to the availability of CCS systems.

Hydrogen is an ideal clean energy source that can be used as an energy storage medium for renewable energy sources. The water electrolysis hydrogen production technology which is one of the mainstream hydrogen production methods can be used to produce high-purity hydrogen and other energy sources can be converted into hydrogen storage by electrolysis. Hydrogen production by alkaline water electrolysis and hydrogen production by PEM electrolysis are all water electrolysis hydrogen production technologies that have been industrially applied. From the application point of view the paper compares the working principle of the two kinds of electrolyzers the process flow of hydrogen production equipment advantages and disadvantages. This article provides a reference for relevant researchers.

The paper presents the experimental research results of heavy-duty vehicle (public transport bus) fuelled with natural gas and hydrogen fuel mixtures. Spark ignition six cylinder engine tested with different hydrogen additions (from 5% up to 20% according to volume) in the natural gas fuel. The tests were performed on heavy-duty vehicle’s dyno test stand in company “SG dujos Auto” research laboratory. The tests were carried out at three load points and one engine speed. Engine had originally a port fuel injection and exhaust gas recirculation system. Experiments showed that engine fuelled with hydrogen addition was able to achieve lower fuel consumption and brake specific fuel consumption. It was also possible to achieve small increase of engine efficiency. The exhaust gas measurements showed that hydrogen addition in natural gas reduced the CO CO2 and HC emissions because of the H/C atom ratio change in fuel mixture and improved combustion process. The NOx emission level was decreasing although bigger amounts of hydrogen were used in natural gas fuel.

The growth of the world’s energy demand over recent decades in relation to energy intensity and demography is clear. At the same time the use of renewable energy sources is pursued to address decarbonization targets but the stochasticity of renewable energy systems produces an increasing need for management systems to supply such energy volume while guaranteeing at the same time the security and reliability of the microgrids. Locally distributed energy storage systems (ESS) may provide the capacity to temporarily decouple production and demand. In this sense the most implemented ESS in local energy districts are small–medium-scale electrochemical batteries. However hydrogen systems are viable for storing larger energy quantities thanks to its intrinsic high mass-energy density. To match generation demand and storage energy management systems (EMSs) become crucial. This paper compares two strategies for an energy management system based on hydrogen-priority vs. battery-priority for the operation of a hybrid renewable microgrid. The overall performance of the two mentioned strategies is compared in the long-term operation via a set of evaluation parameters defined by the unmet load storage efficiency operating hours and cumulative energy. The results show that the hydrogen-priority strategy allows the microgrid to be led towards island operation because it saves a higher amount of energy while the battery-priority strategy reduces the energy efficiency in the storage round trip. The main contribution of this work lies in the demonstration that conventional EMS for microgrids’ operation based on battery-priority strategy should turn into hydrogen-priority to keep the reliability and independence of the microgrid in the long-term operation.

Offshore oil and gas field development consumes quantities of electricity which is usually provided by gas turbines. In order to alleviate the emission reduction pressure and the increasing pressure of energy saving governments of the world have been promoting the reform of oil and gas fields for years. Nowadays environmentally friendly alternatives to provide electricity are hotspots such as the integration of traditional energy and renewable energy. However the determination of system with great environmental and economic benefits is still controversial. This paper proposed a wind– hydrogen–natural gas nexus (WHNGN) system for sustainable offshore oil and gas fields development. Combining the optimization model with the techno-economic evaluation model a comprehensive evaluation framework is established for techno-economic feasibility analysis. In addition to WHNGN system another two systems are designed for comparison including the traditional energy supply (TES) system and wind–natural gas nexus (WNGN) system. An offshore production platforms in Bohai Bay in China is taken as a case and the results indicate that: (i) WNGN and WHNGN systems have significant economic benefits total investment is decreased by 5190 and 5020 million $ respectively and the WHNGN system increases 4174 million $ profit; (ii) WNGN and WHNGN systems have significant environmental benefits annual carbon emission is decreased by 15 and 40.2 million kg respectively; (iii) the system can be ranked by economic benefits as follows: WHNGN >WNGN > TES; and (iV) the WHNGN system is more advantageous in areas with high hydrogen and natural gas sales prices such as China Kazakhstan Turkey India Malaysia and Indonesia.