Hydrogen Large Scale Ship Transport

Hydrogen is both a clean energy resource and an effective energy carrier. The ability to transport large quantities of hydrogen will become necessary, since production sites and consumers of clean energy may be far from each other. Hydrogen produced in Norway from hydroelectricity or natural gas could be an attractive energy source within Europe or even in other continents. In such a scenario long-distance transport is required, and will be most effective by ship, with hydrogen stored in liquefied form (LH2). To reduce the transport costs the energy contents of each ship transport must be sufficiently high, meaning the cargo storage capacity of the ships must reach certain volumes. The current technology for storage of LH2 does not meet the above requirements, and within this project, Moss Maritime, in collaboration with SINTEF Energy Research and SINTEF Industry, will use their accumulated knowledge and expertise from the LNG industry to develop a design for an LH2 containment system suitable for large volume ship transport. The ambition is to study and develop technology for ship storage tanks similar to capacities as found in the LNG shipping industry. Material evaluations have been performed by Sintef Industry as a literature study. The literature survey reveals that there are little or at least incomplete information available on the combined effect of hydrogen and low temperature for both Aluminium alloys and Stainless Steel. The mechanical properties of the selected material under the influence of hydrogen and low temperature will be supported by laboratory tests that will be performed to assure that tank materials are safe to use for storage of hydrogen. The tank structure design is under development and preliminary finite element analyses (both linear and non-linear) have been performed to verify the concept. Extensive use of finite element structure analyses will be necessary to further develop the tank structure and find solutions for the tank supports. The insulation concept including relevant materials have been investigated, and a numerical thermal analysis model has been employed to assure that tank insulation materials meet the target boil-off rate. It will be verified that the design is at an adequate safety level, and in compliance with expected relevant rules and standards for construction. This project may provide the necessary groundwork to commercialize the construction of ships for transport of LH2.

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Commercially available infrastructure to produce and transport liquid hydrogen will be a door opener to 1) large-scale export of clean energy from Norway and 2) utilisation of liquid hydrogen as an environmental-friendly fuel in shipping. The innovation in this project is a novel liquid hydrogen containment system for ship transport with a basis in the commercially available Moss tank used in LNG transport. The new tank will be the largest of its kind in the world. Moss Maritime has long-lasting commercial success with innovative LNG storage tank concepts for maritime applications. Utilisation of LNG storage designs for liquid hydrogen applications can be achieved if 1) the materials are capable of containing liquid hydrogen without loss of structural integrity, 2) the tank can be insulated sufficiently well to maintain the ultra-cold temperatures, 3) viable procedures for filling/evacuating and pre-cooling can be developed, and 4) the containment system is safe. In the project, the material integrity will be tested in the laboratory and by use of computational models. Detailed analysis of the thermal state with numerical simulations will highlight the most critical system components for heat transfer and deliver design criteria for structure design and composition to minimise heat loss to the ambient and unnecessary boil-off. Requirements on the operational procedures for the containment system will be developed. Particular focus to ensure a high level of safety for all aspects of the containment will pave the way towards an application in principle classification. A successful project enables an "Approval in Principle" by a classification agency after the project, to document that the innovation meets an adequate safety level prior to subsequent commercialisation.