Hydrogen for the hydrogen economy
Hydrogen has immense potential as an efficient and environmentally-friendly energy carrier of the future. It can be used directly by fuel cells to produce electricity very efficiently (> 50%) and with zero emissions. Ultra-low emissions are also achievable when hydrogen is combusted with air to power an engine or to provide process heat, since the only pollutant produced, NO{sub x}, is then more easily controlled. To realize this potential, however, cost effective methods for producing, transporting, and storing hydrogen must be developed. Thermo Power Corporation has developed a new approach for the production, transmission, and storage of hydrogen. In this approach, a chemical hydride slurry is used as the hydrogen carrier and storage media. The slurry protects the hydride from unanticipated contact with moisture in the air and makes the hydride pumpable. At the point of storage and use, a chemical hydride/water reaction is used to produce high-purity hydrogen. An essential feature of this approach is the recovery and recycle of the spent hydride at centralized processing plants, resulting in an overall low cost for hydrogen. This approach has two clear benefits: it greatly improves energy transmission and storage characteristics of hydrogen as a fuel, and it produces the hydrogen carrier efficiently and economically from a low cost carbon source. The preliminary economic analysis of the process indicates that hydrogen can be produced for $3.85 per million Btu based on a carbon cost of $1.42 per million Btu and a plant sized to serve a million cars per day. This compares to current costs of approximately $9.00 per million Btu to produce hydrogen from $3.00 per million Btu natural gas, and $25 per million Btu to produce hydrogen by electrolysis from $0.05 per Kwh electricity. The present standard for production of hydrogen from renewable energy is photovoltaic-electrolysis at $100 to $150 per million Btu.
- Research Organization:
- Thermo Power Corp., Waltham, MA (US)
- OSTI ID:
- 20013472
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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