Project description
How liquid organic hydrogen carriers can unlock hydrogen storage
Hydrogen is a clean, efficient energy carrier in various mobile fuel cell applications. However, hydrogen storage is considered a bottleneck problem. One solution may be liquid organic hydrogen carriers, which can store large amounts of hydrogen and release pure hydrogen on demand. With this in mind, the EU-funded SHERLOHCK project will develop active and selective catalysts with partial or total substitution of platinum group metal. To reduce energy intensity during the loading and unloading processes, project partners will develop a novel catalytic system architecture. To minimise the internal heat loss and increase space-time-yield, this architecture will range from the catalyst to the heat exchanger.
Objective
Liquid Organic Hydrogen Carriers (LOHC), consisting on a reversible transformation catalytically activated of a pair of stable liquid organic molecules integrated on hydrogenation/dehydrogenation cycles, are attractive due to their ability to store safely large amounts of hydrogen (up to 7 %wt or 2.300 KWh/ton) during long time and release pure hydrogen on demand. Proof of concept and some commercial solutions exist but still suffer from high cost and energy needed to facilitate catalytic reactions.
In order to reduce the system cost for LOHC technology to 3 €/Kg for large scale applications SherLOHCk project targets joint developments consisting on :i) highly active and selective catalyst with partial/total substitution of PGM and thermo-conductive catalyst support to reduce the energy intensity during loading/unloading processes: ii) novel catalytic system architecture ranging from the catalyst to the heat exchanger to minimize the internal heat loss and to increase space-time-yield and iii) novel catalyst testing, system validation and demonstration in demo unit (>10 kW, >200h); to drastically improve their technical performances and energy storage efficiency of LOHCs:
A combination of challenges for the catalyst material, catalyst system and their related energy storage capabilities will constitute the core of a catalyst system for LOHC, that will be validated first at a lab scale, then in a demo unit > 10kW. As a whole they will enable the reduction of Energy intensity during loading/unloading processes, a higher efficiency and increased lifetime. Technological, economical and societal bottlenecks are considered to determine the economic viability, balance of energy and the environmental footprint of novel catalyst synthesis route.
Scale-up of the obtained solutions will be carried out together with technology comparison with other hydrogen logistic concepts based on LCA and TCO considerations to finally improve economic viability of the LOHC technology.
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Funding Scheme
RIA - Research and Innovation actionCoordinator
75015 PARIS 15
France