Project description
Advancing green hydrogen production through state-of-the-art alkaline electrolysis
The EU-funded HYScale project aims to develop and demonstrate highly efficient, low-cost, sustainable, advanced alkaline membrane water electrolysis technology to produce green hydrogen. The technology utilises novel anion exchange membranes, ionomers, and CRM-free catalysts and components to achieve high current densities. A key objective is to optimise and upscale production of membranes, ionomers, electrodes, and stacks to the 100kW scale. The final system will be tested and validated industrially at TRL5 to accelerate commercialisation. By abandoning critical raw materials and applying new designs, HYScale targets a 50 % cost reduction to 400€/kW and hydrogen costs below 3€/kg. Thus, the project will accelerate electrolysis deployment to produce green hydrogen for energy storage and decarbonisation.
Objective
The HYScale project addresses upscaling of an efficient, durable, sustainable and cost-effective advanced alkaline membrane water electrolysis technology capable of producing economic green hydrogen at significantly higher current densities than SoA electrolyzer. The HYScale technology builds on the results from multiple EU-funded projects. In contrast to SoA electrolyzers, it is entirely critical raw material free without the need for fluorinated membranes and ionomers while meeting a significant fraction of the 2024 KPIs already today at the lab scale. Due to many unique material choices and design features, the HYScale water electrolysis technology distinguishes itself further from the SoA by its potential to be upscaled cost-effective and rapidly. The SME and industry-driven project HYScale aims to upscale its electrolyzer technology with a focus on optimizing materials synthesis and components production, especially membranes, ionomers, electrodes, and porous transport layers. Respecting Europe's circular-economy action plan, a large area stack with an active surface area of 400 cm2 and a nominal power of 100kW will be developed capable of handling a high dynamic range of operational capacities with advanced economic and stable stack components. These efforts will ensure durable and efficient operation at high current densities (2 A cm-2 at Ecell 1.85-2 V/cell) at low temperatures (60 °C) with appropriate hydrogen output pressures (15 bar). The project's final goal is to integrate the stack into a functional electrolyzer system with a CAPEX target of 400 €/kW and its validation in an industrially relevant environment at TRL5. This final step will accelerate technology development, close the gap between research and commercialization, significantly shorten the time to market, and pave the way to a more sustainable Europe.
Fields of science
- natural sciencescomputer and information sciencesinternettransport layer
- natural scienceschemical scienceselectrochemistryelectrolysis
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringmining and mineral processing
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringenergy and fuelsrenewable energyhydrogen energy
Keywords
Programme(s)
- HORIZON.2.5 - Climate, Energy and Mobility Main Programme
Funding Scheme
HORIZON-JU-RIA - HORIZON JU Research and Innovation ActionsCoordinator
75181 Pforzheim
Germany
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.