Potential contributions of the MAST3RBoost project to the automotive industry
An overview of our colleagues from EDAG
Green hydrogen has the potential to contribute significantly to reducing CO2 emissions in the transport sector. Hydrogen powered vehicles are an attractive option, particularly for mobile applications where purely battery-electric vehicles are reaching their limits in terms of weight, range or charging time. Hydrogen vehicles offer lower weight, long ranges (> 800 km) and fast refueling times (3-5 minutes for passenger cars or 20-30 minutes for heavy commercial vehicles).
However, establishing a sustainable hydrogen economy for mobile applications still faces several challenges. In addition to the availability and cost of green hydrogen and the infrastructure, system components in vehicles also need to be further optimized. Regardless of whether it is a fuel cell drive or hydrogen combustion engine, the storage systems must be further improved. In general, there are numerous possibilities for storing hydrogen in vehicles. According to the current state of the art, hydrogen is mainly stored in gaseous form under high pressure (up to 700 bar). Other possibilities include gaseous pressure storage at cryogenic temperatures (so-called cryo-compressed storage) or liquid hydrogen storage (< 20 K). A key objective in the further development of hydrogen storage systems is to increase energy density – both gravimetric and volumetric. These further developments are necessary because the available package space and weight in mobile applications is very limited. As a result, the energy density has a direct influence on the range of the vehicle.
During vehicle development, a suitable storage technology must always be selected to meet the requirements of the vehicle system as optimally as possible. Thereby, the geometric and functional integration of the storage system into the overall vehicle is of particular importance. There are a large number of degrees of freedom here: for example, the number of tanks, the arrangement of the tanks (horizontal or vertical) and the interaction with the filling station and the on-board consumer (e.g. fuel cell). All these and many other criteria must be taken into account in the development phase.
The approach pursued in the MAST3RBoost project of a storage system that uses the adsorption properties of ultra-porous materials at comparatively low pressures (< 100 bar) and low temperatures (~ 80 K) offers the potential to significantly increase the energy density of the storage system. Based on the demonstrator developed in the MAST3RBoost project, it is necessary to evaluate for which mobile applications this novel technology has the greatest potential. One focus here will be on finding suitable applications e.g. in the field of commercial vehicles or trains. EDAG is contributing with its expertise as a system integrator in this context. The goal is to show that this promising storage technology can also be competitive in potential mobile applications.
Follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn for more MAST3RBoost updates!
