A Safe and Efficient, Low-Cost, High-Pressure Metal Hydride, Hydrogen Storage Solution.

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Innovate UK
Innovate UK
Innovate UK
Innovate UK
Innovate UK

£4,064,620

Aug. 31, 2022

Aug. 31, 2024

**VISION-AND-OPPORTUNITY**

In UK 31.5% of all Greenhouse-Gas-Emissions are produced by road transport:

"HGVs account for 18%(20 MtCO2e) and buses/coaches 3%(3 MtCO2e)"---25/03/2021---BEIS-National-Statistics.

Currently _"there are 85,000 buses and 605,000 trucks on the UK's roads (average age 10-years), 98.8%diesel "_ and in the EU_"_ _there are 6.6M-trucks, average-age 12.4-years and 98.3%diesel."_ 'ACEA-The-European-Automobile-Manufacturers-Organisation-2021-Report'.

The UK-target of net-zero by 2030 is clearly defined by the UK Government, supporting the need to substantially reduce emissions from road transport. This reduction can be achieved through replacing them with either Electric (EVs) or Hydrogen-Fuel-Cell-EVs (HFCEVs).

Unlike private cars, HGVs and buses generally drive longer distances, require fast-refuelling, and the weight to fuel-source ratio is lower, all of which favour HFCVs over EVs as the preferred, if not only option, for these 2 vehicle groups.

To service this need a significant economically viable infrastructure of Hydrogen-Refuelling-Stations (HRSs) needs to be built in UK by 2030\.

"In UK there are 8,835 and in EU 136,000 Service Stations"---Statista-12/2021\. Over time a large proportion of these will have to convert to Hydrogen/Electric supply rather than diesel/petrol (currently 11 HRSs in UK). Our opportunity is further cemented by Element-2's plans, recently raising funds to provide over 2,000 pumps by 2030, serving the UK's heavy goods and municipal fleets, and whom we have entered into an agreement with, offering guaranteed revenue.---See-Appendix-Q4-Element2-LOC. HydroStar's target market/partner!

The opportunity for our solution derives from the current process of hydrogen-supply and fuelling of a vehicle known as the 'well-to-tank' routine. The existing process is economically/emission inefficient, on average consuming 35.5% value per tanker-load of Hydrogen---ScienceDirect-osti.gov/servlets/purl/1580696-July2019---calculated from:

1. Production off-site by electrolysis/alternative
2. Compression
3. Delivery logistics
4. Stored/compressed at HRS
5. Decompressed
6. Pumped into the vehicle

Pointing to an essential need for an alternative low-cost, higher-efficiency 'well-to-tank' hydrogen production process/solution.

**OBJECTIVES**

To produce locally, 99.999% pure, high-pressure-hydrogen using, renewable-electricity, low-cost-electrolysers, and innovative hydrogen-storage/compression-cycles (HyPro), not only saving energy, but also reducing traffic-congestion through no/minimal logistics, improving economics, subsequently lowering-air-pollution.

**FOCUS-&-INNOVATION**

The project will build on previous research-and-development (LSBU) of decarbonised hydrogen-storage and high-pressure production, creating an advanced-working-product.

Instead of using huge-pressure-tanks and energy intensive-electric-compressors, innovative thermal-driven (using renewables), compact Metal-Hydride-Reactors (storage tubes filled with low-cost Metal-Hydride-alloys absorbing the hydrogen) will be used to store/purify/compress and decompress the gas, improving safety-and-economics.

**BENEFITS**

20% improvement on efficiency is expected using our HyPro-Solution, because of a significant reduction in costs by eliminating several-stages of the current well-to-tank routine:-Packaging off-site/Logistics hydrogen-plant to HRS/Electric-compression/decompression at the HRS.