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Versatile Hydrogen Transfer for Transport Applications

Project description

Next-gen hydrogen refuelling for a climate-neutral Europe

Decarbonising large-scale transport remains a challenge for Europe’s climate goals. While battery-electric vehicles are suitable for light-duty transport, hydrogen, particularly in liquid form (LH2), offers an alternative for heavy-duty transport. However, the high costs and substantial energy requirements for production, storage, and distribution have slowed adoption. The EU-funded VHyTTA project aims to develop fixed hydrogen refuelling stations with compressed hydrogen, as well as a mobile solution with liquid hydrogen, which can be used to refuel various vehicles, from airplanes to ships, trains, and buses. In addition, the project is working on digitalisation to increase efficiency, while the integration of logistics strategies is intended to support hydrogen hubs in airports.

Objective

While the battery-electric technology could serve as a viable option for passengers’ cars and light-duty vehicles, hydrogen, especially in its liquid form (LH2), offers a promising avenue for decarbonizing larger-scale transportation. To answer the projected 10 billion annual passengers of aviation industry, LH2 is poised to play a key role in decarbonizing short and medium-haul flights.
However, the current substantial energy and capex investment required for electrolysis, compression, storage, transportation and distribution is a costly energy vector and hampering LH2 replacement of diesel/kerosene 3 times cheaper.
VHyTTA seeks to address the obstacles in hydrogen distribution by developing and demonstrating at TRL7 two multipurpose and flexible concepts of HRS: one fixed and one mobile to meet the needs of aviation, maritime and railroad transport sectors and distribute hydrogen to a wide range of vehicles including aircraft, ships (LH2 and GH2), trains, airport fleet, captive fleet and buses.
VHyTTA main objectives are:
- Develop, build and operate a new concept of fixed cGH2 station
- Develop a novel, mobile refuelling solution capable of delivering liquid hydrogen fuel to aircraft & ships in line with customers’ requirements
- Develop and validate models to digitalise the refuelling stations
- Ensure top HSSE standards of HRS delivering hydrogen for multiple applications
- Optimise logistics and value chain integration of a hydrogen hub at airports
- Assess economics and environmental impact of the technologies and demonstrators
VHYTTA will contribute to reach strategical objective 4GW H2 production and distribution by 2030 with >100 refuelling station of hydrogen. Our forecast estimates 1504 routes within Europe that could adopt the liquid hydrogen powertrain. This would result in saving 33.6 million tCO2 by 2035. VHYTTA will provide the infrastructure needed for Europe to become the world’s first climate neutral continent by 2050.

Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)

Keywords

Programme(s)

Topic(s)

Funding Scheme

HORIZON-JU-IA - HORIZON JU Innovation Actions

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Call for proposal

(opens in new window) HORIZON-JTI-CLEANH2-2024

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Coordinator

DNV SERVICES UK LIMITED
Net EU contribution
€ 379 704,03
Address
5TH FLOOR, VIVO BUILDING, 30 STAMFORD STREET
SE1 9LQ LONDON
United Kingdom
Region
London Inner London — East Lewisham and Southwark
Activity type
Private for-profit entities (excluding Higher or Secondary Education Establishments)
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Total cost
No data

Participants (18)

Partners (1)