Decarbonisation Of Food Cold Chain Through Integrated Hydrogen Technologies
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Nottingham
Department Name: Faculty of Engineering
Abstract
The UK government is committed to reducing carbon emissions to net zero by 2050. In order to meet this commitment, it is essential that heating and cooling is decarbonised as it accounts for over a third of CO2 emissions in the UK. A potential solution would be the establishment of a hydrogen-based energy infrastructure facilitating the replacement of fossil fuels by sustainable energy sources. Central to a future energy system based upon hydrogen would be the deployment of hydrogen fuel cells (HFCs) to convert sustainably derived hydrogen (e.g. from solar and wind) to electricity, as they are highly efficient, economic and scalable. The global market for fuel cells is projected to reach US$14. 6 billion by 2027, and the global demand for hydrogen is now over 70Mt rising by 5 Mt a year. If hydrogen is to be an integral part of the UK's future energy system and assist in decarbonisation of heating and cooling, then technologies are required to facilitate the safe and efficient delivery of hydrogen to end use applications. We propose the development of integrated hydrogen technologies that will simultaneously provide the controlled release of hydrogen to service fuel cell power needs and cold production. Key to this technology is the endothermic decomposition of a metal hydride (MH) store to generate cooling, with the resultant hydrogen supplying a fuel cell. By transitioning to a hydrogen-based net-zero economy, our new technology provides an opportunity to assist in the decarbonisation of the UK food chain (agricultural production, manufacturing, distribution, retail and consumption) which is responsible for 18% of the total UK energy use or 115 MtCO2 emissions.
Organisations
Publications
Witman M
(2023)
Towards Pareto optimal high entropy hydrides via data-driven materials discovery
in Journal of Materials Chemistry A
Loh S
(2023)
Substitutional effect of Ti-based AB2 hydrogen storage alloys: A density functional theory study
in International Journal of Hydrogen Energy
McGrath A
(2024)
Stoichiometry and annealing condition on hydrogen capacity of TiCr2-x AB2 alloys
in International Journal of Hydrogen Energy
Dornheim M
(2022)
Research and development of hydrogen carrier based solutions for hydrogen compression and storage
in Progress in Energy
Witman M
(2024)
Phase Diagrams of Alloys and Their Hydrides via On-Lattice Graph Neural Networks and Limited Training Data
in The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters
Pasquini L
(2022)
Magnesium- and intermetallic alloys-based hydrides for energy storage: modelling, synthesis and properties
in Progress in Energy
Adams M
(2022)
Hydride-based thermal energy storage
in Progress in Energy
Description | 17th International Symposium on Metal-Hydrogen Systems, David Grant |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | David Grant, invited speaker: Modelling kinetics and designing practical metal hydride stores |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://www.metal-hydrogen2022.com/ |
Description | 17th International Symposium on Metal-Hydrogen Systems, Gavin Walker |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Gavin Walker, invited speaker: Investigating new (and not so new) systems for hydrogen storage |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://www.metal-hydrogen2022.com/ |
Description | 17th International Symposium on Metal-Hydrogen Systems, Sanliang Ling |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Sanliang Ling, Talk: Ab Initio Modelling of Hydrogen Storage in Intermetallic and High Entropy Alloys |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://www.metal-hydrogen2022.com/ |
Description | IEA TCP Task 40: Energy Storage and Conversion Based on Hydrogen Meeting October 2022 Spain Presentationby Alastair Stuart |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Dissemination of research in hydrogen storage by experts leading to International Collaboration |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | London South Bank University, Sanliang Ling |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Sanliang Ling, invited seminar: Computational and Data Driven Discovery of Solid-State Hydrogen Storage Materials |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |