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Wind2H2 project, a unique facility that uses electricity from wind turbines to produce and store pure hydrogen

Today we begin using our cleanest source of electricity — wind power — to create the perfect fuel: hydrogen," said Richard Kelly, Xcel Energy chairman, president and CEO. "Converting wind energy to hydrogen means that it doesn't matter when the wind blows since its energy can be stored on site in the form of hydrogen."

The facility links two wind turbines to electrolyzers, which pass the wind-generated electricity through water to split the liquid into hydrogen and oxygen. The hydrogen can be stored and used later to generate electricity from either an internal combustion engine turning a generator or from a fuel cell. In either case, there are no harmful emissions and the only by-product from using the hydrogen fuel is water.

Located at NREL's National Wind Technology Center near Boulder, Colo., a new building houses the electrolyzers and a device to compress the hydrogen for storage; four large, high-tech tanks to store the hydrogen; a generator run by an engine that burns hydrogen; and a control room building, where computers monitor all the steps of the process.

"Advancing knowledge and sharing innovation are among NREL's primary goals," NREL Director Dan Arvizu said. "Our growing strategic partnership with Xcel Energy helps us reduce the time and effort between research discoveries and sharing the benefits of what we learn with energy consumers."

Currently, there are limitations to both wind power and hydrogen. Wind farms only generate electricity when the wind is blowing, which is about one-third of the time in the United States. This creates the need for backup generation, which is usually fossil-fueled. Hydrogen, while the most common element in the universe, isn't found in its pure form on Earth and must be either electrolyzed from water or stripped out of natural gas, which are energy-intensive processes that result in greenhouse gas emissions.

"By marrying wind turbines to hydrogen production, we create a synergy that systematically reduces the drawbacks of each," Kelly said. "Intermittent wind power is converted to a stored fuel that can be used anytime, while at the same time offering a totally climate-friendly way to retrieve hydrogen, to power our homes and possibly cars in the future."

News Inside News ;
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), in partnership with the Xcel Energy, launched a wind-to-hydrogen (Wind2H2) demonstration project at the National Wind Technology Center in Golden, Colorado. The Wind2H2 project links wind turbines to electrolyzers, which pass the wind-generated electricity through water to split the liquid into hydrogen and oxygen. The hydrogen can then be stored and used later to generate electricity from an internal combustion engine or a fuel cell. The goal of the project is to improve the system efficiency of producing hydrogen from renewable resources in quantities large enough, and at costs low enough, to compete with traditional energy sources such as coal, oil, and natural gas.

This page describes the Wind2H2 system components, research focus, and project benefits, and provides links to related publications.

System Components
The Wind2H2 project uses two wind turbine technologies: a Northern Power Systems 100-kW wind turbine and a Bergey 10-kW wind turbine. Both wind turbines are variable speed; the blades speed varies with wind speed. Such wind turbines produce alternating current (AC) that varies in magnitude and frequency (known as wild AC) as the wind speed changes.

The energy from the 10-kW wind turbine will be converted from its wild AC form to direct current (DC), and then used by the electrolyzer stack to produce hydrogen from water. The energy from the 100-kW wind turbine will be "picked off" from its existing controller, which produces a DC bus between 750 and 800 V. Since this voltage is too high for the electrolyzer stacks, NREL will design power electronics to make the DC-DC conversion.

Two HOGEN 40RE proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolyzers from Proton Energy Systems and one Teledyne HMXT-100 alkaline electrolyzer will produce hydrogen and oxygen from water. NREL will examine the issues related to the integration of these technologies as well as the operation of electrolyzers with different gas output pressures.

After compressing the hydrogen, it will be stored for later use in a hydrogen internal combustion engine where it will be converted to electricity. The electricity will be fed into the utility grid during peak demand hours.

Research Focus
NREL research will focus on the following areas:

Explore system-level integration issues related to multiple electrolyzers that produce hydrogen gas at different pressures

Evaluate the ability to integrate energy from variable-speed wind turbines directly to the hydrogen-producing stacks of commercially-available electrolyzers

Determine the system impacts and ability of each electrolyzer technology to accommodate the varying energy input from wind turbines and photovoltaics

Quantify system-level efficiency improvements and cost reductions by designing, building, and integrating dedicated wind-to-electrolyzer stack power electronics to enable closer coupling of wind-generated electricity and electrolyzer stack requirements

Gain operational experience of a hydrogen production facility, including the compression of product gas and the use of a hydrogen internal combustion engine to generate electricity during peak demand hours

Evaluate appropriate safety systems and system controls for the safe operation of hydrogen production technologies with varying wind energy input

Demonstrate operation of a wind-to-hydrogen system to enable evaluation of actual system costs and identify areas for cost and efficiency improvements

Explore operational challenges and opportunities related to energy storage systems and their potential for addressing electric system integration issues inherent with variable wind energy resources.

Project Benefits
The Wind2H2 project offers many benefits. It allows researchers to explore how to make hydrogen without producing greenhouse gasses or other harmful by-products. Currently, most hydrogen is "reformed" from natural gas or other fossil fuels by stripping the hydrogen atoms out. This process creates greenhouse gas emissions and eliminates some of the environmental benefits. Hydrogen is also produced through electrolysis using sources of electricity (such as fossil fuels) that generate air emissions.

Other key project benefits include:

Creating synergies from the co-production of electricity and hydrogen

Addressing the variable nature of wind power by storing hydrogen for later use, creating a ready source of electricity for when the wind doesn't blow or the demand for electricity is high

Producing hydrogen for use in vehicles

Comparing multiple electrolyzer technologies to gauge their efficiencies and abilities to accommodate the variable input power of wind energy

Achieving efficiency gains though a unique, integrated AC-to-DC and DC-to-DC connection between the wind turbines and the electrolyzer stacks.

Related Publications
Electrolysis: Information and Opportunities for Electric Power Utilities
Wind Energy and Production of Hydrogen and Electricity—Opportunities for Renewable Hydrogen
Renewable Electrolysis Integrated System Development and Testing (PDF 841 KB)
Characterizing Electrolyzer Performance for Use in Wind Energy Applications
Summary of Electrolytic Hydrogen Production

Some Improtant Links-
To see animation-
http://www.nrel.gov/hydrogen/proj_wind_hydrogen_animation.html
To see video-
http://www.nrel.gov/hydrogen/proj_wind_hydrogen_video.html

In The Images-
1.Xcel Energy CEO Richard Kelly dedicates the system while NREL Director Dan Arvizu (right) and members of the media, government officials and others look on.
2.NREL researcher Peter Gotseff examines the Teledyne electrolyzer for the wind-to-hydrogen project.
3.the Wind2H2
4.Wind2H2 animation.

Release link: http://www.nrel.gov/