Techno-Economic Analysis of 350 BAR LOHC-Supplied Hydrogen Refueling Stations for Heavy Duty Vehicle Fleets

The cost of hydrogen at a refueling station depends mostly on two factors, the hydrogen production itself and the hydrogen supply chain. For both there are different options with LOHC that are in the focus of several scientific discussions. The aim of this work is to contribute to this discussion a techno-economic comparison of a 350 bar Liquid Organic Hydrogen Carrier (LOHC)-supplied hydrogen refueling station (HRS) with a standard HRS. The analysis was focused on supplying hydrogen for a fleet of busses or trains with a total daily hydrogen demand of around 1.2 t/d. A dehydrator required to release the hydrogen from the LOHC as well as other standard components of an HRS were dynamically modelled and optimised depending on various demand profiles of the vehicle fleets using the inhouse simulation software H2ProSim. The results show specific refueling costs (HRS only) of between 2.1 €/kg and 3.3 €/kg for the LOHC-HRS scenarios investigated and a minimum of 0.89 €/kg can be obtained for a standard HRS. This cost difference is mainly caused by the high energy cost of the dehydrator and the added CAPEX. Furthermore, a smart demand management on the vehicle side can lead to significant cost reductions for the HRS infrastructure.