Environmental and economic assessment of hydrogen compression with the metal hydride technology

A critical step in the hydrogen supply chains is the compression phase, which is often associated with high energy consumption and environmental impacts. An environmental and cost analysis of a metal hydride (MH) compressor and competing technologies (an air booster and a commercial hydrogen compressor), is performed for an application to fuel cell driven forklifts. The MH compressor shows limited environmental impacts only when a source of waste heat is available for hydrogen desorption. In these case, impacts would be similar to a generic compressor, but larger than those generated by an air booster. The equivalent economic cost is 6 V per kg of compressed hydrogen for the MH compressor, which is much higher than for the air booster, but lower than for a generic hydrogen compressor. Technical aspects to be improved for large-scale applications of MH com-pressors are identified. (c) 2022 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

This study conducts an environmental and cost analysis of a metal hydride compressor and competing technologies for fuel cell-driven forklifts. The results show that the metal hydride compressor has limited environmental impacts when waste heat is available, and its economic cost is lower than a generic hydrogen compressor but higher than an air booster. Improvement in technical aspects is needed for large-scale applications of metal hydride compressors.