The German industrial giant Siemens is investigating the use of ammonia as a way to store and transport hydrogen in energy systems with high penetration of renewables.
The company this month opened a £1.5 million ($2 million) proof-of-concept plant in Harwell, Oxfordshire, U.K. to test the efficiency of converting electricity to hydrogen, and then to ammonia, and then back.
The plant, funded one-third by Siemens and two-thirds by government agency Innovate U.K., is thought to be the first of its kind in the world.
The U.K. Science and Technology Facilities Council, University of Oxford and Cardiff University are also attached to the project, which includes a wind turbine, a nitrogen generator, a water electrolysis system, a Haber-Bosch reactor and a 30-kilowatt electric genset.
Ian Wilkinson, program manager for the project within Siemens, told GTM that the research into ammonia was complementary to Siemens’ work on other energy storage technologies, such as batteries.
But batteries are primarily useful for electricity, which in the U.K. only accounts for around a quarter of all energy use, he said. “Chemical fuels have a [use case], including energy storage of electricity but also beyond it,” he said.
“It’s pretty apparent that we will need a range of energy storage solutions to decarbonize our electricity generation,” Wilkinson added. “I think a lot of different storage technologies will be required.”
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