Recently we asked the following Question at our December Hydrogen Network and followed this up with a poll on LinkedIn - Which of the following statements best represents your view on Hydrogen Storage?
Recently we asked the following Question at our December Hydrogen Network and followed this up with a poll on LinkedIn - Which of the following statements best represents your view on Hydrogen Storage?
The results are as follows:
A - I don't understand enough about Hydrogen Storage to give an informed opinion 21%
B - Hydrogen Storage will not be required to start the Hydrogen Economy 0%
C - Some small scale localized Hydrogen Storage will be required to build resilience and flexibility for industrial users 10%
D - Hydrogen Storage is vital to enable flexible power generation to back renewables, manage seasonable fluctuations in heat demand and capture any intermittent low carbon hydrogen generation 69%
Geraint Evans, our chief technologist expanded on the results by commenting, "When thinking about energy storage, there are several aspects we need to consider including those shown in the table. There is a need for very short-term storage for system load levelling and load shifting (e.g. flywheel) through to the storage of energy for use as heat in the winter months when there may be a lack of wind – inter-seasonal energy storage. Different kinds of energy storage have different features which meet those needs so a balanced portfolio of technologies will be needed. Hydrogen will be of importance as it allows widespread scale and the ability to provide heat using boilers, particularly if the gas grid is able to accept hydrogen in future, albeit at a lower round trip efficiency compared to other options"
Characteristics of selected energy storage systems (source: The World Energy Council)
“World Energy Resources E-Storage 2016,” World Energy Council, www.worldenergy.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/WEResources_E-storage_2016.pdf, presented in FactSheet_Energy_Storage_0219.pdf (eesi.org)