A team of researchers from the Higher Council for Scientific Research (CSIC) develops the first public hydrogen station in Spain that will use green hydrogen generated in situ with solar energy. Hydrogen will be obtained by electrolyzers powered by a system of solar trackers and photovoltaic panels located at the service station itself. In addition, it will have an intelligent control system that will provide production and demand predictions, offering modularity and flexibility.
Scheduled to start up at the end of 2022, the hydrogen station will have a minimum renewable production capacity of 60 kg of hydrogen per day and will be able to supply trucks, buses, cars and logistics for transport. The new technology will be tested thanks to an agreement with the service station company Zoilo Ríos. It will be tested at the company’s facilities at El Cisne station, on the A-2 motorway (Madrid-Barcelona), a few kilometers from Zaragoza.
“The objective of this development is to demonstrate, in real service conditions, the potential of this technology,” said CSIC researcher Luis Valiño, from the Laboratory for Research in Fluid Dynamics and Combustion Technologies (LIFTEC), currently part of the Institute of Carbochemistry (ICB). The new filling station will have the addition of technology developed by research groups from LIFTEC and the Institute of Robotics and Industrial Informatics (IRI, CSIC-UPC).
Being modular and flexible, the hydrogen station can adapt to different demands (such as vehicle flow and time distribution), to different locations (availability of renewable resources, network connection and connection power). “The objective is that, once the demonstration phase is over, the technology is marketable and widely penetrates the market,” explained Valiño.
This initiative aims to serve as a model for the implementation of the future network of hydrogen stations in Spain. The collaboration between the CSIC and Zoilo Ríos will take place over three years (until December 2024) and will allow the CSIC research groups to evaluate the operation of the different technologies that will be used in the facility, in terms of the generation and storage of renewable hydrogen, advanced energy management and refueling.
For its part, the company will be responsible for the tasks of adapting the service station and the administrative processing required for the installation, as well as providing the necessary resources for the operation of the station during the start-up and demonstration phase, and will also take care of maintenance. Once the project is finished, the agreement contemplates the transfer of the technology developed to Grupo Zoilo Ríos through an exclusive exploitation license.
Source: CSIC
