Oregon Hydrogen briefing
HYDROGEN STORAGE
Hydrogen storage for large-scale use has been a challenge due to hydrogen’s lowenergy content per volume. Hydrogen can be stored as a compressed hydrogen gas in high-pressure tanks, as cryogenic liquid hydrogen in insulated tanks, as a compound within other materials, or on the surface of other materials. Liquid hydrogen has a higher energy density per volume than hydrogen gas but is costly to produce due to the energy needed for cooling. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, “hydrogen storage in materials offers great promise, but additional research is required to better understand the mechanism of hydrogen storage in materials under practical operating conditions and to overcome critical challenges related to capacity, the uptake and release of hydrogen, management of heat during refueling, cost, and life cycle impacts.” One storage concept discussed in Oregon is the hydrogen hub. A hydrogen hub would use hydroelectric or wind power to synthesize ammonia, a hydrogen-rich compound, to take advantage of excess energy that would otherwise be lost (for instance, during spring run-off when energy demand is low, but hydroelectric generation is high). During peak power demand, the ammonia would be burned to produce electricity with water vapor and nitrogen gas as byproducts. A hydrogen hub has not been built.
