Learnings

Outcomes

In addition to the Final Peer Review report, below are the recommendations resulting from the HyScale project.

• Develop a demonstration project for an LOHC system used for inter-seasonal storage applications.
• This will start with an assessment of the carrier of choice between DBT and BT and the kind of reactor to be used (discreet or hybrid).
• Undertake detailed modelling and optimisation of LOHC storage and production facilities using the outputs from the demonstration facility: considering factors such as production efficiencies with load factor, limitations on turn-up and down rates and energy price variation to further understand the potential future storage system.
• Develop chemical engineering plant models that will be used to provide budgetary cost estimates of large-scale facilities on the roadmap of scaling up LOHC systems to inter-seasonal storage of >1 million heat users. This will include the feasibility of large scale LOHC storage vessels that would be required.
• In parallel, activities to assess ammonia (which has similar economics but higher safety risks) and alternative geological storage options (such as aquifers and depleted oil and gas reservoirs, where the economics are unclear and technical challenges need to be addressed) for inter-seasonal storage should be carried out.
• The global developments and commercialisation efforts occurring for LOHCs and ammonia should be monitored by commissioning a technology and commercial watch. All of these technologies have low TRL aspects of the supply chain and so developments may help to accelerate or influence the roadmap set-out in the final report. In addition, advances in the commercialisation of LOHC technology are required to realise the cost reductions noted in the final report.
• Encourage UK based engineering and operation expertise for LOHC systems, for example by following the development pathway mapped, to allow the export of skills for LOHC system operators as hydrogen develops globally.
• Develop a demonstration project for LOHC systems used for the delivery of hydrogen to, or balancing of on-site renewable hydrogen production, for an SIU and for delivery of hydrogen to an industrial user. To prove the use of LOHC in these applications and demonstrate the next step of a larger scale system.

Lessons Learnt

While the peer review broadly supported the findings, recommendations and quality of the analysis presented in the HyScale Feasibility Study, several areas of further work were identified during the peer review. These are:

• Comparison between DBT and BT
• Sensitivity analysis of LOHC storage scenarios
• Canal charges and alternative shipping routes
• UK Hydrogen backbone

The above areas have all been incorporated into the scope of HyScale Phase 2a: FEED Study – the immediate next phase of the HyScale project.