Late Great Engineers: Geoffrey Ballard – Fuel Cell Visionary
If you’ve ever wondered, where the name Ballard came from for the hydrogen fuel cell company, then this article from The Engineer gives a detailed explanation.
French City Cancels Purchase Of 51 Hydrogen Buses After Realising Electric Ones Would Be Six Times Cheaper To Run
The title of this post, is the same as that as this article on Recharge Magazine.
The city is Montpelier and it’s their decision, but I do find it strange, that the French city of Pau have chosen the hydrogen version of the the Van Hool ExquiCity bus.
But Pau have chosen a British hydrogen system from ITM Power, rather than a French one.
Catalyst Capital Makes First Move In GBP 300m Battery Storage Strategy
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Renewables Now.
This is the first paragraph.
Fund manager Catalyst Capital has acquired a site to build a 100-MW battery in Yorkshire, northern England, in the first of a series of planned deals under a GBP-300-million (USD 406.1m/EUR 358.9m) strategy to develop diversified UK battery energy storage systems (BESS) facilities.
£300 million, says to me that the finance industry, now finds battery storage to be a worthwhile investment.
Skelton Grange Power Station
This Google Map shows the location of the Skelton Grange power station site, where the battery will be developed.
And this second Google Map shows the site in more detail.
Note that there is still a sub-station on the site.
The article states that planning permission was received in 2021 and they hope to have the facility on-line in the first quarter of this year.
That appears quick to me. Is it because the electrical connection already in situ?
It should also be noted, that the battery output of 100 MW is much less than that of the former coal-fired power station in the mid-1980s, which was at last 480 MW.
I also wonder, if the site could host a hydrogen fuelling station for buses.
- It is not far from the centre of Leeds.
- It has a good connection to the National Grid.
- An electrolyser like the one built by ITM Power at Tyseley Energy Park uses 3 MW of electricity to produce around 1.5 tonnes of hydrogen per day.
I also feel that the site could host a wind turbine up to about 10 MW.
Conclusion
Catalyst Capital seems to have made a big entry into the market. They won’t be the last to do this, as the returns are there and the battery storage is needed.
Why Use A Hydrogen Pipeline Rather Than A Electricity Cable To Bring Electricity Ashore From A Windfarm?
A comment to the post entitled Siemens Gamesa Partners On Offshore Wind-to-Hydrogen, was as follows.
Trying to get my head around this concept. Build an electrolysis plant in the North Sea and run a hydrogen pipeline to shore, rather than generating electricity and transferring the power by undersea cable to a shore based electrolysis plant. Can it really be better technically and economically? Someone convince me.
The reasons probably all come down to saving money and hassle.
Reusing Existing Infrastructure
Supposing, you have an offshore gas field, which is on the point of being worked out.
- It has a well-maintained platform on top.
- It has a pipe to an onshore terminal that handles the natural gas and distributes it to end-users.
Supposing the following are possible.
- Building a large wind farm in the vicinity of the platform.
- Using the gas field for hydrogen storage.
- Converting the gas terminal from natural gas to hydrogen.
- The end-users can convert to hydrogen.
In some cases the end-users might even prefer hydrogen to natural gas, to help their own decarbonisation.
I would suspect that there will be a sound economic case to use hydrogen, where wind farms are developed, in the same areas as worked-out gas fields.
- Platform demolition costs are deferred.
- No HVDC link is needed, with an expensive converter station at the shore end.
- The new system comes with energy storage.
The only extra cost might be that an offshore electrolyser is more expensive than an onshore one.
Engineering Resources
The engineering resources needed for a gas pipeline are different to those needed for an electrical system.
But because gas pipelines are a declining industry, they will be readily available.
Less Planning Hassle
There have been some objections to the development of wind farm terminals by Nimbies.
If a terminal is converted from natural gas to hydrogen, I suspect there will be fewer objections.
Better Control Of Wind Farms
There have been stories of wind farms having to be switched off because there is no-one to buy the electricity.
If some form of offshore hydrogen storage is possible, then the electricity can be used to generate hydrogen, which can be piped ashore, when it is needed.
It Won’t Be One Type Fits All
I suspect we’ll see some hybrid systems and other innovative engineering.
Conclusion
I believe that in a drive to cut costs, we’ll see a lot of energy brought ashore as hydrogen gas.
I
Carlton Power, Stag Pool Knowledge For UK Energy Storage, Green H2
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Renewables Now.
This is the introductory paragraph.
British energy infrastructure developers Carlton Power and Stag Energy are merging their operations with plans to develop projects that will help improve energy storage, grid stability and green hydrogen production in the UK.
The article says this about Carlton Power.
Yorkshire-based Carlton has delivered more than 6 GW of thermal and renewables generation in the past 30 years. It is the lead developer of the Trafford Energy Park in Manchester, which foresees a 50-MW/250 -MWh liquid air energy storage plant to be built in partnership with Highview Power, a 200-MW hydrogen electrolyser and commercial hydrogen hub for use in transport and heating as well as a 250-MWe battery energy storage facility. Carlton also plans to expand its Langage Energy Park near Plymouth with the addition of energy storage and electrolyser facilities.
They certainly seem to have a history, that will be worth extending into the future, with energy storage and hydrogen production.
The article says this about Stag Energy.
Edinburgh-headquartered Stag Energy, for its part, has previously developed open-cycle gas-turbine (OCGT) plants in England and Wales and has a joint venture with Lundin to build the Gateway offshore underground gas storage facility in the Irish Sea using salt caverns. Stag Energy is also part of the National Grid’s Pathfinder process to uncover ways to improve electricity system stability.
This article on Hydrocarbons Technology is entitled Gateway Gas Storage Facility and starts with these two paragraphs.
The Gateway Gas Storage Company (Gateway) is developing an underground natural gas storage facility, Gateway Gas Storage Facility (GGSF), 25km offshore south-west Barrow-in-Furness, UK, in the East Irish Sea.
The GGSF plant has a strong locational advantage for developing offshore salt cavern gas storage facilities, according to the British Geological Survey.
In my time at ICI in Runcorn, I learned a lot about salt caverns and once had a memorable trip into their salt mine under Winsford, which was large enough to accommodate Salisbury cathedral. A couple of years later, I worked with a lady, who arranged for ICI’s historic documents to be stored in the dry air of the mine.
Natural Gas Storage In Salt Caverns
This section in Wikipedia describes how caverns in salt formations are used to store natural gas.
In the 1960s, ICI used to create boreholes into the vast amount of salt, that lay below the surface and then by pumping in hot water, they were able to bring up a brine, which they then electrolysed to obtain chlorine, hydrogen, sodium hydroxide and sodium metal.
When they had taken as much salt out of a borehole, as they dared, they would move on.
Provided the salt stayed dry, it didn’t cause any problems.
It sounds like the Gateway Gas Storage Facility will use new caverns carefully created under the Irish Sea.
This document from the Department of Energy and Climate Change is an environmental impact assessment of the project.
It has a full description of the project.
The proposed gas storage facility will be located southwest of Barrow-in-Furness, approximately 24 km. offshore from Fylde, North West England. It will comprise 20 gas storage caverns created in the sub-seabed salt strata. A single well will be drilled at each cavern location, and the salt will be removed using seawater pumped down the well. The dissolved salt, or brine, will then be discharged directly to the sea. The size and shape of the caverns will be controlled using an established technique known as Solution Mining Under Gas (SMUG). At each well location, a monopod tower facility will be installed, to house the solution mining equipment required during the construction phase, and the gas injection and extraction wellhead equipment that will be required for the storage operations. It is proposed that the monopod towers will be drilled into position, although there is a contingency for them to be piled into place if drilling is not feasible.
A short pipeline and methanol feeder pipe will connect each wellhead facility to an 8 km. ‘ring main’ linking all the caverns. The ‘ring main’ will consist of a single 36″ diameter gas pipeline with a ‘piggy-backed’ 4″ methanol feeder line. Two 36″ diameter carbon steel pipelines will connect the ‘ring main’ to the onshore gas compressor station at Barrow. A 4″ methanol feeder line will be ‘piggy-backed’ on one of these pipelines. Power for the offshore facilities will be provided via a single cable laid alongside the more southerly of the two pipelines, with individual connections to each monopod tower. The offshore sections of the pipeline and cable systems up to the point of connection with the ‘ring main’ will be approximately 19 km. in length. The pipeline and cable systems will be trenched, and the trenches allowed to backfill naturally. Where necessary this will be supported by imported backfill. The trenches for the two 36″ pipelines will be approximately 20 metres apart, and the trench for the power cable will be approximately 10 m from the more southerly of the two pipelines. The two pipelines will cross the Barrow Offshore Windfarm power cable and the ‘ring main’ will cross the Rivers Field export pipeline and the Isle of Man power cables. All crossings will be suitably protected.
Note.
- The multiple cavern structure would surely allow different gases to be stored. Natural Gas! Hydrogen? Methanol? Carbon Dioxide?
- On this page of the Stag Energy web site, they state that forty caverns could be created, with each having the capability of storing around 75 million cubic metres of working gas.
- Converting that amount of natural gas to gigawatt-hours (GWh) gives a figure of around 800 GWh per cavern.
- This page on the Statista web site, shows that we used 811446 GWh of gas in 2020, so we will need around a thousand of these caverns to store our gas needs for a year.
It sounds just like the sort of gas storage project we need for a harsh winter.
In Do BP And The Germans Have A Cunning Plan For European Energy Domination?, I talked about BP’s plans for wind farms in the Irish Sea and speculated that they would create hydrogen offshore for feeding into the UK gas network.
The Gateway Gas Storage Facility would be ideal for holding the hydrogen created by electrolysis offshore.
Conclusion
The deal does seem to be one between equals, who have an enormous amount of practical knowledge of the energy industry.
I also think, that it will see full development of the Gateway Gas Storage Facility.
Riding Birmingham’s New Hydrogen-Powered Buses
I went to Birmingham today and took one of their new hydrogen buses on route 51 to Perry Barr and another one back.
Note.
- As the pictures show Perry Barr is a bit of traffic bottleneck because of the reconstruction of Perry Barr station an other developments in the area, because of the Commonwealth Games, which are going to e held in Birmingham in 2022.
- The route goes past the High Speed Two site.
- Birmingham is a city of highways, flyovers, underpasses and roundabouts.
- The buses have wi-fi and charging points for phones.
I very much feel that the buses are the best hydrogen-powered vehicles, that I’ve travelled in, as they are smooth, comfortable, quiet and seem to have excellent performance.
Birmingham Buses Have Their Own Hydrogen Electrolyser
London bring their hydrogen in by truck from Runcorn, where it is created by electrolysis, for their hydrogen-powered buses.
On the other hand, Birmingham Buses have their own electrolyser at the Tyseley Energy Park.
This Google Map shows Tyseley Energy Park.
Note.
- The Birmingham Bus Refueler hadn’t opened, when this map was last updated.
- Tyseley Energy Park is only a few miles from the City Centre and route 51.
- I estimate that the Tyseley Energy Park occupies around four hectares.
This page on the Tyseley Energy Park web site described the refuelling options that are available.
- Fuels available include hydrogen, biomethane, compressed natural gas, diesel, gas oil and AdBlue.
- There are a range of charging options for electric vehicles.
The 3 MW electrolyser was built by ITM Power of Sheffield, which I estimate will produce nearly 1.5 tonnes of hydrogen per day.
According to this page on the Wrightbus website, a hydrogen-powered double-deck bus needs 27 Kg of hydrogen to give it a range of 250 miles. The refuelling of each bus takes eight minutes.
So the current fleet of twenty buses will need 540 Kg of hydrogen per day and this will give them a combined range of 5000 miles.
It would appear that the capacity of the electrolyser can more than handle Birmingham’s current fleet of twenty buses and leave plenty of hydrogen for other vehicles.
Could Other Towns And Cities Build Similar Energy Parks?
I don’t see why not and it looks like ITM Power are involved in a proposal to build an electrolyser at Barking.
Some would feel that London ought to follow Birmingham and create its own hydrogen.
.
eCargo Hydrogen Fuel Cell Bikes To Begin Real-World Test In Aberdeen
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Hydrogen Fuel News.
These are some points from the article.
- The bikes will be trialled on last mile applications in Aberdeen.
- The bikes are from Electric Assisted Vehicles from Bicester.
- Six bikes will be used in this trial to gain real world experience of the bikes.
It is interesting to note, that EAV claim, they developed these vehicles as they were worried about the environmental impact of battery electric vehicles.
National Express Deploys Hydrogen Double-Deckers In The West Midlands
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Renewable Energy Magazine.
This is the first paragraph.
National Express has deployed 20 hydrogen double-decker buses purchased by Birmingham City Council, serving West Midlands route 51 to Walsall via Perry Barr from 6th December 2021– the only hydrogen buses operating in England outside London.
The buses are from Wrightbus.
The article also says this about the source of the hydrogen.
The council are also collaborating with ITM, who are producing and dispensing the hydrogen fuel from the new re-fuelling hub at Tyseley Energy Park.
This is surely the way to do it. Hydrogen buses with a local source of freshly-picked hydrogen.
Green Ships Ahoy Along Vital Corridors
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on 7 News Australia.
These are the first two paragraphs.
Australia’s biggest miners are preparing for a day of reckoning.
Shipping accounts for two to three per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions so manufacturers and retailers are no longer just considering what appears in national targets.
The article then goes on to explain how the big mining companies are cutting their emissions.
This paragraph illustrates how important mining and shipping is to Australia.
Resources and energy earnings passed $300 billion for the first time in 2020-21 and will surge towards $400 billion in 2021-22, according to December figures.
Hence the big need for ships fuelled by lower carbon fuels.
Future Offshore Wind Power Capacity In The UK
I am building this table, so that I can get a feel for the electricity needs of the UK.
According to Wikipedia, on February 2020, there were thirty six offshore wind farms consisting of 2180 turbines with a combined capacity of 8113 megawatts or 8.113 gigawatts.
Currently, these offshore wind farms are under construction, proposed or are in an exploratory phase.
- Triton Knoll – 857 MW – 2021 – Under Construction
- Hornsea Two – 1386 MW – 2022 – Under Construction
- Moray East – 960 MW – 2022 – Under Construction
- Neart Na Gaoithe – 450 MW – 2023 – Under Construction
- Seagreen Phase 1 – 1075 MW – 2023 – Under Construction
- Dogger Bank A – 1200 MW – 2023/24 – Proposed
- Dogger Bank B – 1200 MW – 2024/25 – Proposed
- Dogger Bank C – 1200 MW – 2024/25 – Proposed
- Moray West – 1200 MW – 2024/25 – Exploratory
- Hornsea Three – 2400 MW – 2025 – Proposed
- East Anglia One North 800 MW – 2026 – Exploratory
- East Anglia Two – 900 MW – 2026 – Exploratory
- East Anglia Three – 1400 MW – 2026 – Exploratory
- Sofia Offshore Wind Farm Phase 1 – 1400 MW – 2023/2026 – Under Construction
- Hornsea Four – 1000 MW (?) – 2027 – Exploratory
- Rampion Two Extension – 1200 MW – Exploratory
- Norfolk Vanguard – 1800 MW – Exploratory
- Norfolk Boreas – 1800 MW – Exploratory
Note.
- The date is the possible final commissioning date.
- I have no commissioning dates for the last three wind farms.
- Wikipedia says that the Hornsea Four capacity is unknown by Ørsted due to the ever increasing size of available wind turbines for the project.
I can total up these wind farms by commissioning date.
- 2021 – 857 MW
- 2022 – 2346 MW
- 2023 – 1525 MW
- 2024 – 1200 MW
- 2025 – 6000 MW
- 2026 – 4500 MW
- Others – 5800 MW
I can draw these conclusions.
- Total wind farm capacity commissioned each year is increasing.
- It looks like there will be a capacity to install up to 5000 or 6000 MW every year from about 2025.
- If we add my figures for 2021-2026 to the 8113 MW currently installed we get 24541 MW.
- Adding in 6000 MW for each of the four years from 2027-2030 gives a total of 48541 MW or 48.5 GW.
As I write this on a Sunday afternoon, wind power (onshore and offshore) is supplying 13 GW or forty-four percent of our electricity needs.
I have further thoughts.
Parallels With North Sea Oil And Gas
I was very much involved in the development of North Sea oil and gas, as my software was used on a large number of the projects. I had many discussions with those managing these projects and what was crucial in shortening project times was the increasing availability of bigger rigs, platforms and equipment.
Big certainly was better.
I believe that as we get more experienced, we’ll see bigger and better equipment speeding the building of offshore wind farms.
Reuse of Redundant North Sea Oil And Gas Platforms
Don’t underestimate the ability of engineers to repurpose redundant oil and gas platforms for use with windfarms.
Electrolysers on the platforms can convert the electricity into hydrogen and use redundant gas pipes to bring it ashore.
Some processes like steelmaking could use a lot of hydrogen.
Platforms can be used as sub-stations to collect electricity from windfarms and distribute it to the various countries around the North Sea.
Hydrogen
Some processes like steelmaking could use a lot of hydrogen. And I don’t think steelmakers would be happy, if the supply was intermittent.
So why not produce it with giant electrolysers on redundant oil and gas platforms and store it in redundant gas fields under the sea?
A large store of hydrogen under the sea could have the following uses.
- Steelmaking.
- Feedstock for chemical manufacture.
- Transport
- Power generation in a gas-fired power station, that can run on hydrogen.
It would just need a large enough hydrogen store.
Energy Storage
This large amount of wind power will need a large amount of energy storage to cover for when the wind doesn’t blow.
Some of this storage may even be provided by using hydrogen, as I indicated previously.
But ideas for energy storage are coming thick and fast.
The North Sea Link To Norway
The North Sea Link is much more important than an interconnector between Blyth in Northumberland and Norway.
- At the Norwegian end the link is connected to a vast pumped storage energy system in the mountains of Norway.
- This pumped storage system is filled in two ways; Norwegian rain and snow and UK wind power through the interconnector.
- In times of need, we can draw electricity through the interconnector from Norway.
- It has a capacity of 1.4 GW.
- It was delivered on time for a cost of around €2 billion.
It can almost be thought of as an international bank of electricity and is probably one of the most significant pieces of European infrastructure built in recent years.
There are also plans to build NorthConnect, that would connect Peterhead in Scotland to Norway.
Conclusion
It looks like we’ll be able to reap the wind. And possibly 50 GW of it!
The Anonymous Widower 